For the players, the journey to a Wimbledon final involves up to nine matches. For the ball kids, the journey starts in January. charliefscott spoke to two of the ball boys/girls (BBGs) who have been there, done that and kept the T-shirt.
For the players, the journey to Centre Court for a Wimbledon final involves up to nine matches — six in the main draw, and another three if they’ve gone through qualifying.has spoken to two of the ball boys/girls who have been there, done that and kept the T-shirt.
Then there are the January trials. To qualify for full training, students need to gain a certain number of points across four areas of assessment. With competition for places so high, there is little margin for error. A couple of points may be the difference between success and failure.The four areas that they are assessed in are: fitness , knowledge , court work , skills .
“You have to know all the rules of tennis,” says Nahom. “You need to know how to cater to the players, how to ball-boy for them: rolling, feeding, general urgency and speed. It’s difficult at first but over time it almost becomes automatic. You get used to it, and it gets easier over time.” Each candidate is known by a number rather than their name, to avoid any confusion when shouting instructions.
When the Championships begin, Goldson selects six teams of six to be responsible for Centre and No 1 Courts. Another six teams rotate around the other show courts , and the remainder , rotate around the remaining courts .Nahom and Kayleigh know the drill — they were part of the team working on the men’s final in 2022 between Novak Djokovic and Nick Kyrgios. On Friday they were on court for Djokovic’s semi-final win against Jannik Sinner, too.
A typical day involves waking at 8am and getting to Wimbledon at 10am. They have a morning briefing and the first shift starts at 11am. Normally Kayleigh and Nahom’s team starts a bit later in they day, as they work on the show courts and play starts on Centre at 1.30pm BST and No 1 Court at 1pm BST.
But before this Wimbledon he elaborated on his routine. He explained how he takes three balls off the ball kid and, not always but a lot of the time, goes over to his towel. He looks for the newest ball to hit his first serve with, and the oldest ball for his second serve. “This is because usually second-serve points turn into rallies. On the first serve, I’m looking to get a free point, on the second serve I’m looking to engage in a rally with the opponent.
“Quite a lot of us have been hit by a ball before,” says Kayleigh. “I was hit by Kevin Anderson’s serve — that was a big one. They are always like, ‘Oh, sorry, sorry!’ As soon as you get hit, you are more focused on running after the ball to pick it up and then going back into position.
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