Monday, June 29, 2026

W.1- A Fraction of Traction Leads to Sudden Contraction


The smaller they are, the harder they (slip and) fall?











=DAY 1 NOTES=
...well, in late Sunday news, *technically*, the first MD player to exit this Wimbledon never even played a single point.



#30-seeded Emma Raducanu, who'd managed to briefly rekindle discussion regarding her longtime career potential with a final run at Queen's Club (her second final this year, speaking to rare better health in '26), wasn't able to make it back to the court a few weeks later due to a stress fracture injury. She'd been set to open Court 1 play just a few hours later in a match vs. Antonia Ruzic.

A 2021 second-week player at SW19 a few months before her U.S. Open win later that summer (a home court run that ended when she retired due to breathing difficulties and illness), Raducanu's annual return to the grass has traditionally provided her with a chance to right her course. But, also as usual, the Brit seems to be in a perpetual state of "reset" since her one great run in New York.

After having to play two matches on a Saturday at Queen's Club, Raducanu wasn't up to her previous level in the final against Donna Vekic, and now this. As I noted at the time, the moments in which a flag is put down as *possibly* denoting the point from which Raducanu's career will turn back upward are always fleeting. And it looks like we're here yet again.

Raducanu's removal from the MD meant that the British contingent in the women's field dropped to eight, with six of them there after having been given a free pass wild card by the AELTC.

While Raducanu doesn't count in the First Victory/First Defeat situation for this Wimbledon, the first player to lose in the 1st Round was still a Brit, as 17-year old wild card Mika Stojsavljevic (already in her second career SW19 MD) was on the opposite side of the court as #11 Belinda Bencic was the first player to reach the 2nd Round via a 6-2/6-1 domination. The Swiss woman reached the semifinals a year ago.



This marks the first time that a Brit was the first player to lose in the 1st Round at Wimbledon since 2011, when Katie O'Brien fell to a then 40-year old Kimiko Date (that seemed like a significant age barrier back then... in 2026, not so much).

BTW, a year ago, Brit Sonay Kartal was on the *other* side of one of these early-round notes, upsetting Alona Ostapenko to make her the First Seed Out of the event. Kartal is missing from the field this year due to injury, and will drop well outside the Top 100 after the subtraction of her '25 Round of 16 points.

In Raducanu's place on Court 1, British wild card Harriet Dart fell to Ostapenko, so there's a certain roundabout logic to it all, I guess.

As it turned out, after Day 1, the Brits are *still* looking for their first win. All six British women -- Dart, Stojsavljevic, Alicia Dudeney, Hannah Klugman, Mimi Xu and Francesca Jones -- in action on Monday lost, leaving just the Katies Boulter and Swan to try to avoid a shutout on Day 2.

None of the seven British women in last week's qualifying draw played their way into the MD, either. So I guess all those wild cards the LTA hands out to home players in the short grass season -- when players more capable of actually winning matches ask for shots to play in one of the frightfully few grass events leading into Wimbledon only to be turned down (even if they're an event's defending champion) so that token *favors* can be doled out to locals -- aren't really helping that much.

...meanwhile, sometimes a scoreline only tells a small part of the story...



#20 Maja Chwalinska, the surprise RG finalist who was at the center of a discussion about whether she'd be granted a wild card into the Wimbledon MD after her big ranking rise had occurred after the tournament's automatic-entry cutoff date (she *was* ultimately given a free pass, as well as an appropriate-to-her-ranking seed), today became the First Seed Out.

But only after dominating qualifier Mananchaya Sawangkaew, and leading 6-2/5-2, with a MP at 40/30. This this happened...



From that point on, Chwalinska's 2026 Wimbledon slowly but inevitably wilted away and died.



Playing on despite having little ability to move around the court, Chwalinska dropped eleven of the final thirteen games as her Thai opponent went on to win 2-6/7-5/6-2, notching her maiden slam MD win in her second appearance in a major.

Geez, would The Rad really target one of Its own (i.e. a fellow Pole) like that? Eek.



Of course, as this played out, the social media police were out early on things, accusing Chwalinska of faking the injury (when up MP?) and saying that she "didn't really" twist her ankle. Of course, as anyone who has ever come down on an ankle/foot like she did knows (raises hand), one doesn't have to literally *twist* anything for a bad injury. Just the foot bending backwards under one's own weight can sometimes do enough damage to make a big difference (it's why I spent my entire summer before my first year of college with a cast on my foot and walking around on crutches, including while traversing campus during Freshman Orientation Day).

Naturally, if she'd retired instead of gamely playing out the rest of the match, then Chwalinska would have been savaged by those same trolls for voiding the match (and any bets) anyone might have made on it. As it was, in many of the same corners she was called "stupid" and "ignorant" for playing on while risking being hurt worse.

This is why it's best for players to just stay away from *all* of it.



...elsewhere, #4 Jessie Pegula took out Dasha Vidmanova in the Czech's slam MD debut, 7-5/6-3, to improve to 5-1 this grass season, while Tatjana Maria's 6-4/6-4 win over Yulia Putintseva marks the first Wimbledon match win from the 38-year old German (the *second*-oldest woman in the draw, behind you-know-who) since she reached the 2022 semifinals at SW19. Of course, she's reached a pair of tour-level grass court finals since then, including this past weekend in Eastbourne.

Now, these are the quotes we come for (you know, as opposed to blaming opponents for wars)...



Of course, none of that (well, we'll see about the Alcarez part, eh?) aged very well on Day 1, as #1 Aryna Sabalenka won the first women's match on Centre Court this Wimbledon, handling the aforementioned qualifier Teodora Kostovic in the Serbian teen's slam MD debut, winning 6-2/6-3.



Then, a funny thing happened... the Tennis Gods had mercy on us all, proving themselves to be as good and righteous as They *want* to be, as McCartney Kessler double-bageled the WTA's clown princess, Oleksandra Oliynykova, to spare us a Sabalenka/Oliynykova 2nd Round match-up.

Last week in Eastbourne qualifying, Oliynykova posted just two games against Brit Sofia Johnson. Today she collected just 19 total points against Kessler.

Maybe Oliynykova was up late going through four years of Sabalenka's social media posts, amassing all her notes for her big moment in the press conference spotlight that won't happened (she already had a taped segment air on CNN International on Monday). Of course, now she'll just have even more free time to call tennis players Nazis as she wanders the AELTC grounds looking for a microphone, any microphone, to bleat into.

...meanwhile, the Southeast Asian wing of the tour had a great Day 1. Not only did Thailand's Sawangkaew manage her escape vs. Chwalinska, but Indonesian Janice Tjen upset #22 Leylah Fernandez, and then another Thai, Lanlada Tararudee, finally managed to put away Lilli Tagger to join countrywoman Sawangkaew with a first career slam MD win.

Tararudee led Tagger 5-1 in the 3rd, and served at 5-2, holding a MP. But the Austian teenager, with a history of wild eleventh-hour comebacks, got the break and then held serve to force Tararudee to try to serve it out again. This time she did.



...late in the day, the number of players who advanced after saving MP grew to three.



Dayana Yastremska rallied from 3-1 down to take the 1st set from Aoi Ito, who served for the set at 6-5. Then in the 3rd, Ito held a pair of MP on serve at 5-3, then two more on return a game later. Yastremska staved them all off to win 7-6(1)/4-6/7-5.

And Solana Sierra, no stranger to pulling victory from the jaws of defeat (even *actual* defeat) at the All-England Club after last year reaching the 4th Round as a lucky loser, saved double MP at 5-4, 40/15 in the decider today vs. Anna Bondar, then in game 11 saved a BP to hold for 6-5, *then* came back from 15/40 again to break to Hungarian to end the match, winning 6-3/5-7/7-5.






...THE FIRST BECKHAM SIGHTING CAME EARLY THIS YEAR (probably because of the kickball thing, right?)... ON DAY 1:



Is it just me, or does Mama Beckham slightly resemble Margaret Court?



...MAJA MAY BE GONE FROM THIS WIMBLEDON, BUT IF YOU NEEDED A BELATED REASON TO LIKE HER AND ENJOY HER COMPANY JUST A LITTLE BIT MORE, HERE'S ANOTHER CHECKMARK IN HER COLUMN FROM A FEW YEARS AGO... ON DAY 1:




...MEANWHILE, THE WTA SOCIAL MEDIA TEAM IS ALREADY IN TOP FORM... ON DAY 1:




...AND... WELL, THE TOKEN (cough-cough) "PROTEST" IS OFFICIALLY OVER... ON DAY 1:



I wonder if the "protest" about low prize money for lower-ranked players was ended by the AELTC threatening a modest fine that would account for just a small portion of the low prize money won by those players they were so worried about being wronged? And wasn't cutting the time of press conferences actually *beneficial* to the top players, anyway?

Perhaps the most individualistic of all individual-athlete endeavors, tennis is not an altruistic sport. Anyone expecting anything more than mere words from other players (see the Vondrousova case) will always be disappointed. Always.


...MEANWHILE, MARKETA HAS A LITTLE TOO MUCH TIME ON HER HANDS... ON DAY 1:




...MIRRA THANKING... THE TENNIS GODS (and Serena... at least I *don't think* she's pulling double duty in that discussion)... ON DAY 1:




...WEEK 25 BOOKKEEPING UPDATE... ON DAY 1:




...BTW, I STILL DON'T LIKE THE SUNDAY STARTS AT MAJORS... ON DAY 1:

...but I haven't missed the 32-match Day 1 (and Day 2, as well) schedule, either.



...HMMM, I THINK SOMEONE MIGHT BE ONTO SOMETHING HERE... ON DAY 1:
















As always when it's my birthday, I like to offer you all something, a few words, to say thanks for all the kindness and care over the years. My best to you all. D x ๐Ÿ™๐Ÿฟ #SundayThoughts #birthdayvibes

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— Dr Dwight Turner (@dturner300.bsky.social) June 28, 2026 at 12:06 AM















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*RECENT WIMBLEDON "FIRST SEED OUT"*
2016 #25 Irina-Camelia Begu, ROU (Witthoeft/GER)
2017 #31 Roberta Vinci, ITA (Kr.Pliskova/CZE)
2018 #19 Magdalena Rybarikova, SVK (Cirstea/ROU)
2019 #10 Aryna Sabalenka, BLR (Rybarikova/SVK)
2021 #10 Petra Kvitova, CZE (Stephens/USA)
2022 #31 Kaia Kanepi, EST (Parry/FRA)
2023 #15 Liudmila Samsonova, RUS (Bogdan/ROU)
2024 #8 Zheng Qinwen, CHN (Sun/NZL)
2025 #20 Alona Ostapenko, LAT (Kartal/GBR)
2026 #20 Maja Chwalinska, POL (Sawangkaew/THA)

*RECENT WIMBLEDON "FIRST VICTORY OF THE FORTNIGHT"*
2016 Dasha Kasatkina/RUS (L: Duval/USA)
2017 Wang Qiang/CHN (L: Chang/TPE)
2018 Yanina Wickmayer/BEL (L: Barthel/GER)
2019 Madison Keys/USA (L: Kumkhum/THA)
2021 Aryna Sabalenka/BLR (L: Niculescu/ROU)
2022 Alison Riske/USA (L: In-Albon/SUI)
2023 Barbora Stycova/CZE (L: Zanevska/BEL)
2024 Varvara Gracheva/FRA (L: Tsurenko/UKR)
2025 Elina Svitolina/UKR (L: Bondar/HUN)
2026 Belinda Bencic/SUI (L: Stojsavljevic/GBR)





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This one is especially pathetic

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— MeidasTouch (@meidastouch.com) June 29, 2026 at 9:32 AM



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— Trifid Duane of Canada๐Ÿ๐Ÿ‡จ๐Ÿ‡ฆ (@trifidofcanada.bsky.social) June 29, 2026 at 9:33 AM

๐Ÿคฆโ€โ™‚๏ธ

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— AgonyFlips (@agonyflips.bsky.social) June 29, 2026 at 9:39 AM


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Read @geneweingarten.bsky.social The Great American State Fair, Part II open.substack.com/pub/genewein...

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— Ann Telnaes (@anntelnaes.bsky.social) June 29, 2026 at 10:21 AM


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TOP QUALIFIER: Robin Montgomery/USA
TOP EARLY-ROUND (1r-2r): x
TOP MIDDLE-ROUND (3r-QF): x
TOP LATE-ROUND (SF-F): x
TOP QUALIFYING MATCH: Q1 - Anastasia Gasanova/RUS def. Varvara Lepchenko/USA 2-6/6-1/7-6(12-10) - Lepchenko led 5-3 in the 3rd, twice served for the match, led 5-1 in MTB and at 9-6 held four MP over a 5-point stretch. Gasanova wins 12-10.
TOP EARLY-RD. MATCH (1r-2r): x
TOP MIDDLE-RD. MATCH (3r-QF): x
TOP LATE-RD. MATCH (SF-F/Jr.-WC): x
=============================
FIRST VICTORY: #11 Belinda Bencic/SUI (def. Stojsavljevic/GBR)
FIRST SEED OUT: #20 Maja Chwalinska/POL (1st Rd. - hurt ankle/foot on MP up 6-2/5-2 vs. Sawangkaew/THA)
FIRST SLAM MD WINS: Day 1: Anastasia Gasanova/RUS (2nd MD), Mananchaya Sawangkaew/THA (2nd MD), Lanlada Tararudee/THA (2nd MD)
UPSET QUEENS: x
REVELATION LADIES: x
NATION OF POOR SOULS: x
LAST QUALIFIER STANDING: Day 1 wins: Gasanova/RUS, Liu/USA, Sawangkaew/THA
LAST WILD CARD STANDING: Day 1: 0-6 (S.Williams and Swan to play Day 2)
PROTECTED RANKING WINS: Day 1: Sorribes Tormo/ESP
LUCKY LOSERS: Day 1: Semenistaja/LAT(L)
LAST BRIT STANDING: Day 1: 0-6 combined (Boulter and Swan to play Day 2)
Ms. OPPORTUNITY: xx
IT "?": x
COMEBACK PLAYER: x
CRASH & BURN: x
ZOMBIE QUEEN OF LONDON: Nominees: Sawangkaew (1r- trailed #20 Chwalinska 6-2/5-2 and MP down when #20 seed hurt ankle/foot; first career slam MD win); Yastremska (1r- Ito held 4 MP over two games in 3rd set); Sierra (1r- Bondar 2 MP at 5-4, 40/15 in 3rd)
DOUBLES STAR: x
VETERAN PLAYER (KIMIKO CUP): x
LAWN COURT ROLLER: x
JUNIOR BREAKOUT: x
SPIRIT OF JANA (NOVOTNA) HONOREE: Nominee: Chwalinska (devastating loss in 1st Rd. after having MP at 6-2/5-2 before fall injuries ankle)







All for Day 1. More tomorrow.

posted by Todd.Spiker @ 6:15 PM 

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