Yup. You better believe it. The roof is now officially in duty. On day 7 of an unusually dry tournament at the Wimbledon Championships, the newly installed, £80 million retractable was called into action at around 5 PM.
With raindrops sprinkling Centre Court, the grounds crew pulled the tarp cover across the field while the tournament organizers contemplated on using their newest gadget After a 5 minute wait, the roof began to move to the delight of the crowd who watched in amazement as a layer of cantilevered fabric made a shield against the sky.When the roof completely shut out the rain 7 minutes later, the fans in the stands gave the retractable a roaring applause. With that, tradition was broken and we were going to play indoor tennis at Wimbledon!
With more reverberation as a result of the roof, every stroke of the racket and every roar from the crowd was amplified. It made for a cool sound effect as Dinara Safina and Amelie Mauresmo finished their match under the roof.
That set the scene for the match of the tournament so far. The pride of Scotland, third seeded youngster Andy Murray came trotting out to meet the hometown fans. Stanislas Wawrinka, of Switzerland was his opponent.
Wawrinka powered his way through the opening set 6-2 and even though the sky outside had cleared, the lid at Centre Court remained shut. In the second and third sets, Murray rallied the crowd back into the game, winning both by a score of 6-3. By the fourth set, it was pushing 9 o’clock in London. The moon was up and shining but with artificial lighting installed onto theroof, they just kept on battling.
The match went past 9:35, the previous record for the latest finish ever at Wimbledon. Then, after a long, battle-filled, emotionally charged fifth set, Andy Murray closed the door on Wawrinka, winning 2-6, 6-3, 6-3, 5-7, 6-3.
The crowd under the roof and those gathered on the hill outside Centre Court jumped in celebration and headed for the Underground.
It was 10:39 PM, more than an hour past the unwritten Wimbledon Curfew.
With that appropriately exciting 4 hour duel between Murray and Wawrinka, history was made and tradition was broken at Wimbledon.
It only took 132 years.
-D
*The Daily Telegraph contributed to this article.
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