In an era when it might be said that tennis’ foremost grass competition continually fell into the same patterns–odd shock result in first week, usual suspects in final–its 2009 vintage provided storylines that were both surprising and infinitely pleasing. A Look at Wimbledon 2009 In the boys’ contest, there were players with potential flying in from all angles, though in retrospect it is worth noting that only seven of the 64 participants went on to reach the Top 100 of the senior game: Bernard Tomic, Pierre-Hugues Herbert, Andrey Kuznetsov, Tennys Sandgren, Denis Kudla, Jozef Kovalik, amd Liam Broady. There were another ten who later found themselves in the Top 200, moving in and out of the ATP tour frame rather than consistently flourishing, as have many in the above list; the failure of 2009 junior runner-up Jordan Cox–a product of the renowned Bollettieri Academy–to make any kind of inroads (he retired at 25 with a ranking peak of #449) perhaps proves that age-group success doesn’t merit more attention than the tournament itself.
As southern England experienced a heat wave and the music world mourned the death of Michael Jackson, the All-England Club had balanced the time-worn–that rule on wearing all-white vesture–with the cutting-edge: a new £80 million roof on Centre Court. The august tradition of bestowing wild cards on young hopefuls was seen in qualifying, where 18-year-old Marcus Willis was one of seven locals to fall at the first two stages (his.
