Join us as Jon Wertheim talks Iga Świątek's commanding win over Sonia Kenin and Novak Djokovic's inspiring return after knee surgery. Get the inside scoop on the latest from the Royal Box, where rock legends Dave Grohl and Simon Le Bon were spotted soaking up the action. Unfortunately, the day wasn't without its heartbreaks—Andy Murray has made the tough decision to withdraw from singles due to spinal cyst surgery, but he'll still be competing in doubles. Plus, we dissect the shock of defending champion Markéta Vondroušová's early exit, shaking up the women's draw in unexpected ways.
Join us as Jon Wertheim talks Iga Świątek's commanding win over Sonia Kenin and Novak Djokovic's inspiring return after knee surgery. Get the inside scoop on the latest from the Royal Box, where rock legends Dave Grohl and Simon Le Bon were spotted soaking up the action. Unfortunately, the day wasn't without its heartbreaks—Andy Murray has made the tough decision to withdraw from singles due to spinal cyst surgery, but he'll still be competing in doubles. Plus, we dissect the shock of defending champion Markéta Vondroušová's early exit, shaking up the women's draw in unexpected ways.
Hey everyone, john Wertheim, here from behind court 14 at Wimbledon Day two. This is Quick Serve, presented by Oslo Sleep Buds. Interesting day at Wimbledon. We'll be checking in periodically. Quick hints regarding the tournament top moments, storylines, upsets.
Speaker 1:
Day two was a typical Wimbledon early round day A little bit of rain, a couple of upsets, some familiar faces, some new faces. Dave Grohl and Simon Lebon were seated near each other in the Royal Box. Very importantly, we'll spare you the Foo Fighters and Duran Duran puns and dad jokes and just get right to the action. As with day one, day two came with a couple of rain delays. Apart from the course here at Wimbledon, it would not be Wimbledon if the tarps didn't come out at least a few times. The good news here, of course, is that there are two covered courts, so there is continuous play. But on the outer courts it was a little bit of a stop-and-start situation, with the exception of one groundskeeper who seemed to have got eaten by Tarp. We actually heard he's OK, but everybody survived. Some matches got pushed, but this is par for the course at Wimbledon. The showers were annoying. They were sort of persistent, but persistently brief. Some of the matches were delayed at least three times, but the delays weren't particularly long. So a little bit of your standard Wimbledon rain delays. You'd have a little bit of havoc on the schedule. A couple of matches were pushed, the fourth ons were told essentially to go home. We're not going to get you in before the sun goes down, but we saw the benefit of having roofed courts. And again, it would not be Wimbledon if we did not see some umbrellas getting trafficked in the gift shop here.
Speaker 1:
Iga Svatic, number one seed, just won the French Open, just won Roland Garros. Now she's trying to do the channel double and win Wimbledon. She hasn't gotten beyond the quarterfinals. She started off against Sonia Kennan, former major champion, and Iga looked good Not great, but good, got through, did what she needed to do. One down, six to go. Andy and I talked about how her draw is no fun and the dangerous players in her order in particular still remain. But a good first outing for Iga.
Speaker 1:
You know who else had a good first outing? The seven-time champion, novak Djokovic. Ordinarily, no surprise, novak Djokovic winning his first round match breezily. However, just a few weeks removed from knee surgery, there were some questions, but he seemed to move just fine. To the naked, untrained eye, there was no indication that he was at all compromised. He got through and now he faces Jake Fearnley. Who is Jake Fearnley, you wonder? Good question. He played for TCU six weeks ago, helping TCU win the NCAA title, and now here he comes, likely a center court assignation.
Speaker 1:
Six weeks later at Wimbledon, djokovic talked a lot about the knee. He seems to be fine. He said you know nothing to see here, folks, and his tennis certainly bore that out. I do think there is this interesting sidebar. We've been a bit distracted and not talked perhaps enough about Novak's tennis, the guy who won three majors last year and at the fourth one here he came within a few points of winning all four. He hasn't won a title of any size so far in 2024. He has not even reached a final, did play well in Paris but then, of course, had a knee injury. So it's very strange. I mean, we're talking about him as a contender, as we ought to, with anyone who won seven titles. We're also talking about a 37-year-old man coming off knee surgery who hasn't gotten to a final at all in 2024. But the tennis was good today and Novak lays on here's.
Speaker 1:
Who does not play on, unfortunately, is Andy Murray, another 37-year-old. Not a huge surprise, but it still came with a significant stab of disappointment this morning when it was all but made official and the spinal cyst surgery that Murray underwent 10 days ago or so it was going to take a lot longer to recover than this Wimbledon. So he announced he's been at rehab, it's been 24-7, but he just hasn't been able to play. Certainly not singles, he'll play doubles. He did say that this is the last time he'll play Wimbledon, still on the Olympic docket. So perhaps it's not time for the full-on retirement retrospective. But some air was taken out of this tournament, no doubt today when it was official and Andy Murray, two-time champion, sir, knighted national hero, he will not be in the single straw. Andy and I have talked about this on the podcast, but it sort of gets back to this question of stars playing deep into their 30s. That's great. What is not always so great about that is it seems that less and less often certainly didn't happen with Federer, it's unclear if it'll happen with Nadal Less and less often are they getting to say just where and when the finish line exists and resides. So fortunately, sort of Andy Burry's body made this decision for him. It doesn't look like he will ever play Wimbledon singles again, which is a disappointment.
Speaker 1:
There were some surprising results, some upsets I wouldn't say huge in the grand scheme of things, but still some convulsive results. Marketa Vondrosova, the defending champ, christened center court today, as the defending women champions do, and she did not succeed. She will not be defending her title. She lost in the first round to Spanish newcomer Vondrosova's Wimbledon record. She's won eight matches here. Seven of them Came Last year.
Speaker 1:
Keep an eye On her Opponent, who has a Tattoo on her finger that reads S-H-H-H. We asked her what that meant and she said it's when the haters start hating. She can just hold her finger Up like this and they can see the Shh. She can Tell Um she. She can have said so. You tell the haters to shut up. Um good, good tattoo, good tattoo. Intel.
Speaker 1:
Other winners uh, giovanni Petchy-Péricard, a lucky loser who Andy and I were both touting. Six foot, 10 inch, 20 year old, from France, he'll now be in the top 50. So his days of being a qualifier and a lucky loser are probably behind him. He was terrific today, taking out Sebastian Korda 51 aces. That's a lot of aces. Then again, 6'9 is a lot of height as well. For our friend Giovanni. This is a vat of grapes maturing into wine in front of our eyes. Really a poised performance. Apart from 51 aces, he also faced 11 break points and Korda converted none of them. So apart from serving bombs, he also served clutch, and he moves on.
Speaker 1:
Keep an eye on Giovanni Pesci-Perry guard. He's had a bit of a, a bit of a coming out at the, at Roland Garros a lot of agents watching his matches, a lot of chatter. And now he comes to Wimbledon, beats a seed and lives up to some of the hype. And he's gotten plenty of grief for picking Irina Sabalenka to win this event. Uh, we'll give him a do-over, since arena sabalenka did not even post on account of her shoulder injury. But uh, credit where it's due.
Speaker 1:
Andy also dismissed the possibility of alicia parks, the hard-serving american beating carolyn wozniacki. He was absolutely correct. That was six, two, six, love. A lopsided scoreline for wozniacki, who got the wild card a former, former major champion and she moves on, which, I think, to Andy's larger point. This is the crass oversimplification that big serve equals success on grass. You get burned when you go that top line and this was a case of just a superior returner, a superior mover, a superior player more experienced, beating one of probably the five best servers on the women's tour. But Carolyn Wozniacki a resounding win. Give Andy Roddick some credit, as you rightfully shower him with grief for picking a winner who didn't even post Other results.
Speaker 1:
Andre Rublev also upset. Another major, another Andre Rublev breakdown. You can watch the self-flagellation on YouTube. But he falls to Francisco Comisana. Not a player too many had winning that match. But Rublev, who of course is a six seed. We all know about what he can do week in, week out. He cannot seem to get it together in majors, has never been beyond a quarterfinal and it won't happen here because he's out in round one. Uh. Other results of note uh, ben schultz was down two steps to love last night. Uh, that would have been a disappointing defeat. Went home, slept on it, came back and uh, prevailed in five sets. Very nice win for him.
Speaker 1:
Shelton next will play Lloyd Harris, the South African. Again one for your YouTube pleasure. Go look how Lloyd Harris closed out Alex Mickelson on match point. One of the all-time great match points you'll ever see. Shelton gets Lloyd Harris next.
Speaker 1:
If you have a court, one ticket on Wednesday, day three, you are very happy why you get to see the defending champion, carlos Alcaraz. Remember most tournaments, most of these majors, the top players tend to play most of their matches on the biggest court, but one match on the other court. This will be Carlos' day on court one. Also on court one Naomi Osaka, four-time major champion, against Emma Navarro. Very interesting match. We'll see what Naomi Osaka's level is. Emma Navarro very interesting match. We'll see what Naomi Osaka's level is.
Speaker 1:
Big day tomorrow. Some matches that were pushed on account of the rain today. So a lot on your docket. But day two good day for tennis, good day for the top seeds. Not so good day for the defending women's champ, or some of the seeds in the middle Alexandra Zverev, elena Rabakuna, also among the winners. They are both seeded for their respective draws. Uh, the tournament rolls on and so do we. This was quick serve from the grass of wimbledon. Oslo sleep buds is our proud sponsor. Uh, a shameless plug that you can catch rap action on tennis channel that generously lets us use the studio for podcasting purposes as well. On tennis channel, that will be for six hours following match play every day, and we will do another one of these soon. Enjoy the tennis. Enjoy day three, wednesday at Wimbledon, and we'll talk in 24 hours.
