Tuesday, July 9, 2013

WIMBLEDONE! Final Entry: Murray Breaks The Curse! (...By Casting Additional Curses?)

(All curses are broken with True Love's Kiss.)

I love how I reported on all the craziness that happened for 2 weeks at Wimbledon and then don't say anything about the Men's Final for like 3 days. Congrats to Andy Murray for winning his first Wimbledon Championship, bringing the 77 year drought of a British-Born Wimby champion to an end!! His homeland rejoices! The curse has been broken! And we finally know the answer to the question on everyone's minds for a fortnight: who really has been holding all the voodoo dolls in his racket bag? It turns out it was Murray all along!
 
(The voodoo dolls are now hidden inside the trophy!)

Now we can see how all his biggest adversaries uncharacteristically fell by the way side. How the dark magic was too much to be contained and took over the women's draw as well. How in the final the previously wickedly accurate serve of Djokovic became a mess of double faults. The previously serene Novak became impatient and agitated. He made three incorrect challenges in the second set and then couldn't believe when another call went against him that he couldn't challenge (had he a challenge left to spare, he'd have lost it on that point as well. What we thought would be a knock down drag out affair turned out to be a rather straightforward straight set affair. Djokovic was in a bit of a haze. He couldn't maintain early breaks in both and couldn't convert multiple other break point chances. It was simply not his day. Someone forgot to drink he Felix Felicis potion before the match.

It's not hard to be thrilled for Andy Murray. What relief and joy and satisfaction he must feel in the wake of winning the pinnacle of men's tennis, not only for himself, but for his mother, his coach Ivan Lendl, and his country. The pressure on him was enormous, so to pull of a victory in those circumstances against such an elite player in Djokovic is really a triumph.

(Even Bradley Cooper and Clive Owen need to stand up and applaud Murray's efforts!)

Afterwards, Murray looked dazed as much as he did elated. He spoke afterwards about how much that last game of the match took out of him mentally. In truth, he was up 40-0 on his own serve, only one point from the Championship. But Novak refused to go easily. There would be no easy gifts. Suddenly it was 40-15, then, 40-30, than deuce, then break point AGAINST Andy. And the whole centre court crowd began to (mostly quietly) freak the hell out. Murray fought back to deuce. Then had another break point against him. He fought that one off. Had ANOTHER break point against him! What was it going to take? Apparently everything. Murray through everything he had into winning three consecutive points. He did it. But it took everything he had. Sue Barker from the BBC told him in his on court interview how tortuous the final game had been for his fans to watch, to which he honestly replied, “Imagine having to play it.” I hope he takes a well earned victory lap around the country and then a nice long vacation to recharge his mental battery.

So Andy has his first Wimbledon trophy, his second Major title and an Olympic gold medal. What a difference a year makes when he was moved to tears as Wimbledon Runner-Up and NO major titles!   After winning Murray told all his family and friends and supporters, that he had “tried his best.”Almost as if he hadn't won! He just wanted them to know how hard he tried to give them the victory they all wanted. Well played, Andy. Even if I'll always tease you about using Dark Magic to get there, we both know deep down you earned it and deserved it.

 (All dressed up for the Champions Ball!)

I'd like to close out my Wimby 2013 blog coverage with this amazing quote I read by Marion Bartoli about what it felt like to win her first Major Championship. I totally love it and think she's awesome.

“You know, I don't know if you can really realize, but for a tennis player, you start to play like at five or six years old. When you decide to turn pro, your dream is to win a Grand Slam. You dream about it every single day. You think about it every single day.

So when it happen, when it actually happen, you felt like, you know, you achieve something that you dream about for maybe million of hours. You went through pain, you went through tears, you went through low moments, and actually it happened, once it happened.

Those five, ten seconds before you shake the hands of your opponent, you felt like you're almost not walking any more on earth. You're really flying. It's really hard to describe how it felt.

That was the perfect day. It was sunny. It was beautiful. Centre Court Wimbledon, it was packed. I won in two sets. I didn't drop a set for the whole championship. Even in my perfect dream I couldn't have dreamed a perfect moment like that. That is beyond perfection.”

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