Wimbledon

i got court 2, day 3 and ground passes for mens finals

Underground, overground, Wombling free
The Wombles of Wimbledon Common are we
Making good use of the things that we find
Things that the everyday folks leave behind

Uncle Bulgaria, he can remember the days
When he wasn't behind the times
With his map of the world
Pick up the papers and take them to Tobermory

Wombles are organised, work as a team
Wombles are tidy and Wombles are clean
Underground, overground, Wombling free
The Wombles of Wimbledon Common are we

People don't notice us, they never see
Under their noses a Womble may be
Womble by night and we Womble by day
Looking for litter to trundle away

We're so incredibly utterly devious
Making the most of everything
Even bottles and tins
Pick up the pieces and make them into something new
Is what we do

Underground, overground, Wombling free
The Wombles of Wimbledon Common are we
Making good use of the things that we find
Things that the everyday folks leave behind

Looks like the ticket sales were a shambles (because they were being run by TicketMaster).

In order to buy tickets (or even ground passes) you needed a special code from MyWimbledon that you needed to have registered by yesterday to get in time.

Only they delivered loads of the access codes late (past the 1pm time the site opened).

But you could access the ticket sale, and select some of the tickets you wanted without needing to login to anything or enter this code. It's only when you got close to buying the tickets did you need to enter this unlock code.

So lots of people with no unlock codes were accessing the site, trying to select tickets, only to be stumped by talk of an unlock code they had no idea about.

Meanwhile people with the unlock code (which only worked once per day) would get as far as selecting tickets they wanted, but the payment part with Ticketmaster failed and dumped them out. At which point it would mark that unlock code as used for that particular day, so no chance of buying tickets for that day again.

Also, the site doesn't show you only what is available, it lets you click 3 levels deep (type of tickets, date, queue) before it then tells you that nothing is available for that selection.

Even when you get to try and find the tickets it's obviously smashing some internal database problem as I get a mixture of "An error occurred and we could not reserve your tickets" or "There has been a problem with the connection" when clicking on the "Find Tickets" button for a specific type/date/etc.

Just search for "wimbledon tickets" on twitter to see the hate that TicketMaster are getting...

(My first purchase of ground passes for the first Monday went through fine, but I'd finished the transaction by 1.05pm and that included 2 minutes of faff to reset my TicketMaster password.)

yeah i got loads of errors in the process and i consider myself a bit of a ticket buying pro, my wife was totally stumped by queues and errors but i managed to get straight back onto the booking page and use her code.

Also now realising that I'll need to sort out a lateral flow test for myself (and my daughter if I take her) as I'll be double jabbed but not the full 14 days after the second jab.

A £30 ground pass might be more expensive with a lateral flow test. I take it you can't just use the self test one...

Reckon they've royally fucked up the ticketing arrangements, opportunity to get more than a pair of tickets, 50% capacity early on and no tournament last year, expecting the touts are going to clean up

take it you can't just use the self test one...

You could for Edgbaston last weekend.

Free kit from boots, upload to NHS and then show the SMS confirm to the entrance staff.

you can use the home ones

OK, good to know. Ta.

(We get the boxes of 7 lateral flow tests delivered from the gov.uk website when we need them.)

expecting the touts are going to clean up

Doubt it, you need to show photo ID matching the ticket you've bought to get in.

If you buy 2 tickets you need to "assign" one of them to your guest and get them to sign up to a MyWimbledon account.

Then they need photo ID and vaccination status (or negative lateral flow status) proof to be shown at the gate.

Touts be fucked on all of that.

Reassuring

Men's singles final turning into a proper fight

Hoping for an Italy one two today
Forza Matteo!

Djokovic winning is inevitable, he could play good, bad or ugly but at the end of it I'm pretty certain he'll be the one celebrating.

Also, that strapping on Matteo's thigh is not a fashion statement, he appeared to grimace a couple of times during his last service game so wouldn't be surprised to see a medical time out at the end of the 2nd set.

Come on Tim!

The electronic ticketing arrangements this year are sub optimal with reception in the ground so poor that the required myWimbledon app simply doesn’t update or load tickets (so much for the vaunted use of Big Data this year). The advice from the chaps letting you get to seats is just to screenshot your ticket and show that. They have no qr readers so once in the grounds easy enough to share your ticket with anyone.

Add in no meaningful ID check outside so touts can just get tickets assigned to a myWimbledon app and share the log in with the buying punter.

Did enjoy the tennis though and pleasant weather has given a decent thigh tan line without the need to bother with any of that cycling lark.

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Women's won by a Russian under a flag of convenience after they banned Russians. Men's won by the worst human being in (non-US) sport - apart from the guy he beat. Also, nobody turned up.

Fuckity bye, tennis.

Women's won by a Russian under a flag of convenience after they banned Russians.

Not the whole picture that. Elena Rybakina switched to Kazakhstan many years ago, not just a quick switch prior to the Championships so she could dodge the ban on Russians. She switched in 2018 principally because the Russian Tennis Federation wouldn't back her financially and Kazakhstan would. She's represented Kazakhstan at the Olympics. Not the first or last player to switch nationality for these reasons.

And yes Djokovic is a cunt for all the antivax shite, his sense of entitlement and load of other things, but the worst human being in non-US sport is a bit of a stretch. Is he a worse human being than the countless footballers that have been accused (and some convicted) of sexual assault and rape? I think not.

Also, nobody turned up.

Apart from Russians, Belarusians and a few unfortunate ones that got Covid either in the run up or during the tournament, from the men's side everyone was there. Don't confuse Djokovic being a generational talent, all-time great and most dominant player of the past 10-11 years for a lack of depth in the game.

Players turned up, but unfortunately for them Djokovic playing at 7/10 is still good enough to win it.

after they banned Russians

Rybakina switched to Kazakhstan in 2018.

Also Nadal vs Fritz was an incredible watch. Pretty great tournament this year I thought.

Edit - @ElGonzo beat me to it.

Women's won by a Russian under a flag of convenience after they banned Russians

Rybakina switched to Kazakhstan in 2018 after they offered her a load of money to fund her career. Had the option to switch to US as well.

So, yeah, a Russian under a flag of convenience, changed for cash monies, then won a tournament which fucked its own importance by banning 'Russians', seems we're all agreed on that.

OK, maybe Djokovic and Kyrgios are not as bad as some individual unknown rapists, but the fact that that's the best argument anyone can say for them pretty much speaks for itself. Let's put them into an algorithm that takes into account their utter awfulness, their profile in a solo sport and maybe even the amount of people they've killed. They're not coming out of this too well.

The people who didn't turn up were the audience.

what have you got against Russian people?

Hot take.

What would you say if Amanda Anisimova had won?

Back to the tennis though, here’s the new champ

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