I don’t know who it was who reported David Nalbandian’s idiotic kicking of the Queen’s Club advertising boards, and consequential injuring of line-judge Andrew McDougall, to the police but whoever it was may have done the sport a huge favour.
There has been no
equivalent example of violent conduct committed during Euro 2012, which is
developing into one of the best international football championships of the
modern era, and it is not hard to understand why. The punishment handed down by the ATP to Nalbandian – a boorish,
temperamental oaf with form – pales in comparison to what the footballing
authorities would have done had a similar act been committed by, say, Joey
Barton or Mario Balotelli.
Who comes out of the
incident well? Clearly, not
Nalbandian. Nor the Queen’s
tournament director, who failed to ensure that a full explanation of what had
happened was provided to the audience.
Nor the ATP World Tour Supervisor Tom Barnes, who, when interviewed on
the BBC afterwards, appeared arrogant and condescending.
Not the BBC
themselves, whose analysis in the aftermath suffered from a clawing sycophancy
that made them look like little more than ATP lickspittles. Barnes, who one imagines is never
confused with a ray of sunshine, could scarcely have had an easier ride when
called into the BBC courtside studio.
Where was even the merest hint of a question regarding the wisdom, or
otherwise, of aborting a high profile final on terrestrial television? Why were heaven and earth not moved in
order to help put on a show? The
answers to these and many other questions were not forthcoming, as the BBC
simply didn’t ask them.
Then we have the ATP
themselves, whose response to Nalbandian’s act of reckless aggression has been
feeble. Nalbandian has been fined €10,000
– a feeble sum to a player with the career earnings of the former Wimbledon
finalist – and forfeits his Queen’s prize money. He has not been banned.
Nicklas Bendtner, the
Denmark striker, has been banned for Denmark’s next competitive international
match for the foolish but harmless offence of wearing clothing bearing the logo
of an unauthorized sponsor. He has
also been fined ten times the amount charged to Nalbandian. He should have worn racist pants; on
UEFA’s current form, that would have brought him a much more modest penalty.
Queen’s Club should
also be asked questions about why garish boards are necessary around the shins
of base-line judges. There used to
be a tennis club in West Kensington, now it is a pile of advertising hoardings.
So Nalbandian is free
to compete at Wimbledon. Quite how
the SW19 crowd – still a baying phalanx of Home Counties prissiness – will
react to his entrance early next week is a matter best left to conjecture. But he shouldn’t be there. Tennis remains a sport seemingly
incapable of standing up to the childish antics of high profile players – they
have indulged the wretched Serena Williams and the oafish Andy Roddick for
years. Their attitude to
wazzockish behaviour is that of Queen Victoria to lesbianism; they simply don’t
believe it happens. This isn’t
football, after all, chaps. The game
is deluded. In this respect, as in
many others, football, for all its myriad faults, has a great deal to teach
other sports.
