Wimbledon Qualifying Report 2 from Tony G

Sitting in the evening sunshine at Wimbledon train station, I have time to reflect on the last week here. Arriving into Heathrow after 12 hours from KL, it was a fairly simple exercise to get on the tube with my luggage, change at Earls Court and catch the District line to Wimbledon Park and a short walk to my host family, cousins of my wife.

Here struck first rule of travel, always let them know you will be staying with them! Oops doorway surprise, just as well they didn't give away my bed :)

Friday, my first day in London for 11 years so off to see some of the sights. Buckingham Palace, Hyde Park, Waterloo and Piccardilly are all still there. Sunday brought a chance to see Cricket at Lords, a T20 match involving Adam Gilchrist & Scott Styris. A close match with Styris's team, Essex losing by 5 runs to Middlesex 200/4 - 195/7. Good day out surrounded by Australians, another kiwi and a few raucous English fans. To business, on the way home I checked out the bus route to use for the first day of qualifying, plenty of options depending on which stop I wanted to get off the Tube.

Monday 14th June 2010 - Day one of Wimbledon Qualifying Arriving on the 85 bus from East Putney proved not to be the most direct route to Roehampton but my internal GPS proved invaluable again and after 20 minutes of brisk walking I arrived in time for the 9.00am checking and uniform pickup. Next to find out the crew allocations for the first day. Posted on the window of the chief umpires window all umpires were assigned to a team leader. I was happy to see I would be with old friends Matthew McAleer and Catherine Caswell from Australia and had a good mix of countries in our team D. We were allocated with

two other crews to cover courts 2 & 3 with 90mins on and 45 mins off.

At the crew meetings we were introduced to Matthew Morrisey who was responsible for selecting me and would control all the line & chair umpire assignments for the next three weeks at both the qualifying and Wimbledon Championships. Day one went well with me calling serve base most of the day. Really nice courts and the sound of Tennis played on grass has a unique muted quality. Unfortunately Dan King-Turner, 2 courts down, had a very close loss 15-13 in the 3rd set, here you play best of 3 sets but final set advantage only in the last round do the matches replicate the championships playing best of 5 sets. The day ended prematurely with my jinx coming true here too, every tournament I have worked at an international level this year has had rain on the first day, oops shouldn't tell too many people about that one!

Tuesday dawned a grey day with a cool wind, it saw me change crews to the crew I would spend the rest of the week with, Sharron Whorton an

L1 graded umpire from London was our team leader for team A. Today court 13 with an hour on and hour off. Right next door to Marina Erakovic starting her qualfying tournament against English hopeful Emma Webley- Smith, a close 3 set win saw me not leave court side until that was completed. Good timing too as a report from James Tucker that it was 0-0 at half time in the World Cup Football NZL v Slovakia, a quick dash to the clubhouse to catch the last gripping 30mins amongst Slovak supporters, and then the moment most Football fans will remember where they were when Reid scored in the 93rd minute, a cheer erupted and I quickly wondered if it was me but I turned around to be greeted by an ecstatic GD Jones. As the only kiwis in the grounds we exchanged high 5s and then let the professional space between players and officials take over but smiled each time we saw each other over the next few days, sharing sporting success half a world away from home. Compared to the first two days, Wednesday & Thursday were mild in comparison, more courts less players and nice warm weather, even hot a tan in English sun! Having finished all matches on the Thursday we were released, but were reimbursed for Friday as well, good deal :)

My Wimbledon experince was fast coming to a close but there was still one more important chapter to come, my first day at Wimbledon main draw and just found out I would be able to get to centre court to see Federer start his campaign.