Upset Alert
Flavia Pennetta had the dubious honor of being the first seed to go down as she lost in three sets to Zarina Diyas while Barbora Strycova failed to back up last year's quarterfinal result against Sloane Stephens. Ninth-seeded Carla Suarez-Navarro managed only one winner during her meek-looking loss to Grand Slam debutante Jelena Ostapenko. On the men's side, Spanish veteran Tommy Robredo lost in straight sets to Australian John Millman, while Pablo Cuevas was knocked out by American wildcard Denis Kudla.
Fitting Farewell
Lleyton Hewitt, the famous Aussie Battler, lost in the first round of his final Wimbledon but, as always, he put up a good fight. Hewitt stretched the four-hour match all the way to a 9-11 fifth set conclusion—the longest fifth set of his career. Hewitt was the 2002 Wimbledon champion and is planning to retire following the 2016 Australian Open.
The Comeback
Veteran Tommy Haas seems to have made at least a dozen comebacks onto the tour after a litany of various injuries and unfortunate setbacks. He's back again after missing a year's worth of pro tennis and played just his fourth match of the year yesterday. The 37-year old Haas topped Dusan Lajovic of Serbia, becoming the oldest man to win a Wimbledon match since Jimmy Connors did it in 1991 at 38-years old.
Double Double Bagel
Venus Williams played brilliant tennis dishing out a 6-0, 6-0 beating to her countrywoman Madison Brengle. Fellow American Shelby Rogers was also on the receiving end of a double bagel administered by Andrea Petkovic. Petkovic played fine during the 38-minute match, but Rogers was clearly hampered by a knee injury.
"I don't really like the sport of that much tennis that much."
This quote from a Nick Kyrgios interview actually broke last week, but it was clogging up the ESPN crawl all day yesterday during first round Wimbledon coverage, so I figured it was fair game. I hardly think this quote is as big of a deal as some folks have made it, and Kyrgios wouldn't be the first talented tennis player to not be in love with the sport (think two-time Slam winner Marat Safin, who went so far as to say he didn't like any sports). In more relevant news, Kyrgios advanced, but not without incident. He accidentally hit a linesperson with a ball (the two laughed about it later) and apparently called himself "dirty scum" at one point, leading to this humorous exchange during his post-match press conference:
https://twitter.com/BenRothenberg/status/615521409914281984
Ferrer Out
Also not exactly the freshest news, but David Ferrer withdrew from the first round with an elbow injury, giving the players in the third quarter a bit of a reprieve. He was replaced by lucky loser Luca Vanni of Italy.
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