Watching Wimbledon
What do you say about the Federer-Nadal final that hasn’t already been said? My wife and I watched the whole match. It was the first sporting event, by my best recollection, in four years of marriage that we have watched together from start to finish. In my mind, that epitomizes how amazing this match was.
Many are calling it “arguably the greatest tennis match of all time.” I can’t speak to that. It was the best tennis match I have ever seen. It was the best tennis match John McEnroe has ever seen. That’s all I know for sure.
Federer and Nadal have established themselves as, far and away, the two best players in the world. Their rivalry is equal to or greater than any other tennis rivalry. More than that, it is one of the greatest rivalries in all of sports.
But…
Federer is Swiss. Nadal is Spanish. Wimbledon is played in London.
I love my country, but this is one of those times that American sports fans make me sick. Most American sports fans did not watch the Wimbledon final. Why? Because it had nothing to do with the United States. It’s sad but true.
I wish that Americans would open up to tennis. McEnroe said it best when the final came to an end: “If this match doesn’t raise interest in our sport, nothing will.” He’s right. What he didn’t say was this: Until an American — another Pete Sampras or Andre Agassi perhaps — appears, we won’t watch. It speaks to the selfishness of Americans. We see it with interest in soccer. We see it now with tennis.
The ethnocentricity — which is just a fancy word for selfishness — of Americans used to bother me. Not anymore. After yesterday’s Wimbledon final, I feel like it’s your loss if you didn’t watch. If you skipped it because it was tennis or because there wasn’t an American playing, then it’s your problem, not mine.
Today, I get to enjoy the beauty of what I saw. You don’t. I guess you’ll just have to wait out the long summer until football starts. Isn’t that what typical Americans do?
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