{"id":571,"date":"2015-06-26T09:00:32","date_gmt":"2015-06-26T09:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/OU-Sport\/?p=571"},"modified":"2015-06-25T13:48:30","modified_gmt":"2015-06-25T13:48:30","slug":"wimbledon-is-here-finally-the-summer-of-sport-begins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/OU-Sport\/?p=571","title":{"rendered":"Wimbledon is here \u2013 finally the summer of sport begins"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Simon Rea<\/strong><\/p>\n

This summer in the absence of an Olympics Games or major men\u2019s football tournament sports fans are relying on events such as the women\u2019s Football World Cup, the first European Games in Baku and the ICC women\u2019s championships for entertainment.\u00a0 From Monday 29th<\/sup> June this will be supplemented by two weeks of Wimbledon fever and a supply of tennis from lunchtime to bedtime.\u00a0 The British tennis fans will be asking whether all our hopes of glory rest with Andy Murray or can any other British players have a good run in the tournament.<\/p>\n

\"TennisBallNetSky\"<\/a>

Image courtesy of PinkBlue at FreeDigitalPhotos.net<\/p><\/div>\n

Who will win?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The men\u2019s singles and women\u2019s singles could not be more different at the moment in terms of predictability.\u00a0 If asked most people would answer that one of four, possibly five, men will win the men\u2019s title while it seems that anyone could win the women\u2019s title.<\/p>\n

Women\u2019s tournament<\/em><\/p>\n

Serena Williams is once again the favourite for the women\u2019s title and has been in spectacular form winning the last 3 major tournaments.\u00a0 Most recently she won the French Open on her less favoured surface of clay but she hasn\u2019t won Wimbledon since 2012.\u00a0 Is she overdue to win or is her time at Wimbledon over?\u00a0 If not Serena then two time winner and defending champion Petra Kvitova must be a favourite to succeed or Maria Sharapova, who has not won since 2004. These three stars of the game are joined in the top 5 by Simona Halep of Romania and Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark, both of whom have appeared in Grand Slam finals. Personally, I think this may be the year for Wozniacki who has underperformed at Wimbledon but in the last two years her performances have steadily improved and she has gained the consistency needed for success.<\/p>\n

Men\u2019s tournament<\/em><\/p>\n

Novak Djokovic is favourite for the men\u2019s title just ahead of Andy Murray.\u00a0 They recently shared an epic semi-final on clay at the French Open that Djokovic just won before he was beaten in the final by Stanislas Wawrinka.\u00a0 We are living through probably the toughest era in men\u2019s tennis where four men, Djokovic, Federer, Nadal and Murray, have been competing for the major titles.\u00a0 There has often been a rivalry between two players but never have we had four of the best players ever to play the game competing in the same era.\u00a0 This has meant that each man has had to raise their game and work on every weakness to remain competitive<\/p>\n

I think that this year may be Andy Murray\u2019s year to win a second title.\u00a0 Firstly, he came very close to beating Djokovic after producing incredible tennis to drag himself back from two sets down. Djokovic is probably his closest rival at the moment and grass courts represent Murray\u2019s favourite surface.\u00a0 He recently replicated his form of 2013, when he previously won Wimbledon, at the Aegon Championships to win the tournament convincingly.\u00a0 His form has been up and down over the last two years but he finally seems fit and strong after his back surgery towards the end of 2013.\u00a0 Murray needs to ensure that he doesn\u2019t lets his opponent back into the match during the second set after he has won the first.\u00a0 If he can show his ruthless streak he would be very well placed to succeed this year.<\/p>\n

Are there any other British players to watch out for?<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Heather Watson and Laura Robson are now well established on the tennis circuit but Robson has only recently overcome a wrist injury that had kept her side-lined for 17 months.\u00a0 Watson is joined in the top three British women by Naomi Broady and a relative newcomer, Johanna Konta.\u00a0 Konta is Australian born and has never got beyond the first round at Wimbledon, however, she performed impressively at the pre-Wimbledon Aegon tournament in Eastbourne where she knocked out 2 top-20 players so she is definitely one to watch.<\/p>\n

British men\u2019s tennis has a new number two in the shape of Aljaz Bedene who is ranked 74 in the world and has held a British passport since March, having moved to Britain from Slovenia seven years ago to develop his tennis career.\u00a0 It is the first time since the days of Henman and Rusedski that Britain has had two men in the world\u2019s top 100. He has never won a grand slam match but is one to watch to see how he responds to the fervent support of the British public.<\/p>\n

This summer may be quieter than others but hopefully along with the England women\u2019s football team and England cricket teams there will be plenty of success to savour.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Simon Rea This summer in the absence of an Olympics Games or major men\u2019s football tournament sports fans are relying on events such as the women\u2019s Football World Cup, the first European Games in Baku and the ICC women\u2019s championships for entertainment.\u00a0 From Monday 29th June this will be supplemented by two weeks of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,48],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-571","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-simon-rea","category-wimbledon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/OU-Sport\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/OU-Sport\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/OU-Sport\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/OU-Sport\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/OU-Sport\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=571"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/OU-Sport\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":576,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/OU-Sport\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571\/revisions\/576"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/OU-Sport\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=571"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/OU-Sport\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=571"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/OU-Sport\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=571"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}