Prepare for a fortnight of British failure at Wimbledon

David Mellor
18 Jun 2008

Rafael Nadal's victory at the Artois Championships sets up the mouthwatering prospect of a Wimbledon final in which Roger Federer will finally be deposed. Last year Nadal came close - this year I think he'll do it. Not that I have anything against Federer; he's a great champion. But competition is good for the game, and for Wimbledon, especially since the British challenge now depends on one physically and psychologically fragile, erratic young man, Andy Murray.

To be fair to Murray, which isn't always easy, at least he's up there. Our next man, who isn't even a household name in his own front room, and who is so anonymous his best friend said "I don't know who you mean", is at 260 in the world. And our women are a joke.

One of tennis's elder statesmen told me the other day he thinks Murray has gone as far as he can. I hope that's wrong, but there's evidence for it.

His thumb is just the latest in a long line of injuries. His inability to settle with a coaching team able to impose some consistency on his game has allowed the best of his contemporaries to move way ahead of him - Novak Djokovic, the Australian Open champion, is the same age as Murray, while Nadal at 22 is only a year older.

Murray is not a likeable young man, but in his artless, Kevin-the-Teenager way, sometimes reveals uncomfortable truths, principal among them the way mediocrities are cosseted by the cash rich, talent-poor Lawn Tennis Association, showered with wild cards to Wimbledon they don't deserve, and offered financial rewards that should only come with effort and success.

In part this is because the LTA use their Wimbledon cash as a substitute for coherent thought, but really it's the low level of participation in tennis here that's to blame.

It's a middle-class sport, and the middle classes don't produce many champions in tennis or anything else.

Until ordinary urban kids are empowered, we will be doomed to rather pathetically pinning all our hopes on a flawed young Scotsman.

The National Lottery was supposed to offer every school kid a sporting chance, by testing hand-eye coordination etc, and offering coaching to those who showed promise.

But that was before the Government started raiding the till, and, 15 years after the lottery started, I don't believe there are more working-class kids playing tennis today than there were then.

And the result of this failure to link promise to resources will be obvious during another Wimbledon fortnight that will once again be a humiliation for us Brits.