News24
12 Jul 2019, 12:42 GMT+10
Cape Town - Here are the happy tidings emerging from a South African perspective as Wimbledon's incident-packed, uniformly high-quality Grand Slam tournament promises to culminate in a crescendo of exceptional, eagerly-awaited match-ups.
Despite Cape Town-based doubles specialist, Raven Klaasen, and his New Zealand partner, Michael Venus, losing to the formidable Colombian pair of Robert Farah and Juan Sebastian Cabal in Thursday's semi-final, there will be a tangible South African influence in the final.
What on the surface appears as something of a paradox is explained by the fact that Farah and Cabal are coached by former South African Davis Cup player, Jeff Coetzee, himself noted for his doubles exploits and who has after several years at the helm of the Colombians guided the South Americans to become the most successful doubles couple on the ATP circuit in 2019.
And a further irony of Klaasen and the 42-year-old Coetzee standing poised in opposite corners for the Wimbledon semi-final is that their careers and tennis upbringings are so strikingly similar, with both reaching a conclusion timeously that they were not going to make the top-bracket in singles and deciding to turn their attention to the doubles court - where Klaasen will achieve a career-best world ranking of eighth or better on Monday and Coetzee reached a world ranking of 12th during his own successful playing career.
Meanwhile, it's been a contrastingly unhappy Wimbledon for top South African player and 2018 finalist Kevin Anderson, who as a result of his early third round loss against an in-form, impeccable Argentinian Guido Pella will not only drop out of the prized top 10 places in the world rankings for the first time in more than a year, but he is also set to shed a massive 1 110 ranking points while slipping to 11th position.
The Wimbledon woes have culminated in a year of interrupted tournament appearances for Anderson which have been marked by injury and minimum success, with the current Grand Slam in which he received a somewhat surprising fourth seeding designed to be the ideal avenue for a comeback.
"It must have been especially disappointing for Kevin after he was seeded fourth, in spite of his eighth ranking at the time, which theoretically should have assisted in him receiving a more sympathetic draw," said South African-born Kevin Curren, himself a former Wimbledon finalist.
"Also Pella, who beat Anderson, is a stroke maker in the highest bracket, but his success in the past has been on hard and clay courts and in Anderson he had to overcome someone whose big serve is considered a particularly potent weapon on grass surfaces."
Get a daily dose of Zimbabwe Star news through our daily email, its complimentary and keeps you fully up to date with world and business news as well.
Publish news of your business, community or sports group, personnel appointments, major event and more by submitting a news release to Zimbabwe Star.
More InformationWASHINGTON, D.C.: Travelers at U.S. airports will no longer need to remove their shoes during security screenings, Department of Homeland...
WASHINGTON, D.C.: An elaborate impersonation scheme involving artificial intelligence targeted senior U.S. and foreign officials in...
SLUBICE, Poland: Poland reinstated border controls with Germany and Lithuania on July 7, following Germany's earlier reintroduction...
WASHINGTON, D.C.: After months of warnings from former federal officials and weather experts, the deadly flash floods that struck the...
MOSCOW, Russia: Just hours after his sudden dismissal by President Vladimir Putin, Russia's former transport minister, Roman Starovoit,...
DHARAMSHALA, India: The Dalai Lama turned 90 on July 6, celebrated by thousands of followers in the Himalayan town of Dharamshala,...
Vancouver [Canada], July 11 (ANI): Canadian journalist Daniel Bordman called the attack on a cafe owned by comedian Kapil Sharma a...
KHARTOUM, July 10 (Xinhua) -- It was 2 p.m. in a displacement camp on the outskirts of Port Sudan, where the relentless sun had already...
The 17th BRICS summit was more than a photo op. It was a coordinated rejection of Western power and a declaration of intent A few...
The 17th BRICS summit was more than a photo op. It was a coordinated rejection of Western power and a declaration of intent A few...
New Delhi [India], July 11 (ANI): South African all-rounder Wiaan Mulder has revealed that legendary West Indies batter Brian Lara...
URUMQI, July 10 (Xinhua) -- A total of 24 journalists from 23 countries have participated in a media tour of northwest China's Xinjiang...