Wimbledon Women's Semifinals This Morning

In the 1970s, tennis took off as a major sport as stars like Billy Jean King, Chris Evert, and Jimmy Connors rose to the forefront.  It's attracted a large following ever since, although I believe the mass popularity of the sport has diminished somewhat...along with disco dancing, I remember that playing tennis was a big fad in college.  I never was very good at the sport...then again, I just enjoyed volleying the ball back and forth across the net with someone of similar inability, with the two of us seeing how long we could sustain the volleys...not exactly tennis as it is ferociously played in the professional setting.  My parents both were avid TV tennis fans...they both kept up with the different ongoing tournaments and the star players.  After my mother died in 2002, my father continued following it...our phone conversations were often a little awkward when he would go off rambling about this tournament or that star, while I was totally ignorant of it all.  He, too, passed away two years ago...now whenever a major tournament is going on or one of those players he liked to discuss is on TV, I remember him and his enthusiasm for tennis.  Which brings me to the Wimbledon tournament, which is going on right now and is into the singles semifinals...

The women's stages at Wimbledon are a day or two ahead of the men's.  Their first semifinal match featured two overachievers: 20th-seed Garbine Muguruza won a close match against #13 Agnieszka Radwanska to reach the finals.  She will play the winner of the match going on at this moment (shown on ESPN) between Serena Williams, the #1 seed, and 4th seed Maria Sharapova.  Williams, who had lost the Wimbledon final to Sharapova in 2004, has now won 16 straight matches between the two.  Whoever wins this match, most likely Serena, will be the overwhelming favorite in the final, to be played Saturday.

The men's singles semifinals, which will be shown tomorrow morning, features three "regulars" and one underdog.  Roger Federer (#2) will face Britain's favorite son Andy Murray (3) while upstart Richard Gasquet (#21) plays top-seeded Novak Djokovic.  The men's final match will take place Sunday.  The reason we see the tennis in the morning is the time zone difference between England and the U.S....their matches are played in the afternoon, local time...

I don't have any preferences in the tournament, although nationalist readers would probably urge me to root for Serena, the one American left among the "elite eight".  Maybe I'll end up doing just that, but not because of her nationality.  My main focus in watching Wimbledon right now is to get a better sense of what the game is about, the players' strategies, and the game's flow.  Maybe it's still not to late to develop an interest in this sport...after all, who knew I'd ever enjoy watching soccer!