It’s never been a dream of mine to go to something like the Australian Open. Wimbledon, yeah maybe. But the Australian Open in Melbourne, Australia, is a tournament I always thought would be something I watched in the middle of the night on ESPN when I couldn’t sleep at home in bed.
Turns out that’s not the case anymore though. Through the heat wave that is starting to run through Melbourne and the sunburn that inevitably came with it, I got to experience the Australian Open up close in person.
Talk about a long day, when the tennis starts at 11 a.m. and doesn’t end until well after the sun goes down.
While the tickets I had didn’t allow me to see players like Serena Williams, Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray, I did get to see some of the best tennis players in the world in Maria Kirilenko, Alexandr Dolgopolov, Marin Cilic and Milos Raonic.
With the sun high in the sky at 11 a.m., Kirilenko got the day started against relatively unknown American Vania King. King held her own in the first set, but Kirilenko is ranked No. 12 in the world on the women’s side and proved why as she dominated the second set and cruised into the second round.
Next, we went to see our neighbor to the north, Canadian M. Raonic, who is ranked No. 13 in the world on the men’s side. Raonic struggled a little bit, as his opponent, Czech Republic’s Jan Hajek, took him the distance, going all five sets in the sweltering heat. The energized Raonic pulled out the win, but by no means did he make it look easy.
Following Raonic vs. Hajek on the same court was one of my favorite American tennis players on the women’s side. By no means is she a star. There are plenty of Americans that are better known than she is, but what 21-year old Melanie Oudin did at the U.S. Open in 2009 put her on the map and made her one of my favorites.
As a 17-year old who only expected to last a match, maybe two, in New York in 2010, she made one of the most improbable runs tennis has ever seen, upsetting top-ranked player after top-ranked player day in and day out deep into the tournament. While she didn’t win the tournament, losing to then No. 9 Caroline Wozniacki, she was the talk of the tournament and definitely made a name for herself.
However, Tuesday was not her day. She was dominated from the word “Go” by Great Britain’s Laura Robson, losing in straight sets.
Being a so-called "country club sport" like golf, older times would have patrons of the event dressed up to come see their favorite players compete against one another. One thing I noticed most was the older attendees were still dressed up in pants and dress shirts, some even with jackets even though it approached 100 degrees. The younger generation of fans though clearly was changing the game. There were t-shirts and even no shirts on fans while others had their face painted in their country’s flag. The older folks stayed quiet while the younger folks made it known that it was a different era.
During the Oudin and Robson match, Robeson cruised through the first set, winning 6-2. Between sets, a group of younger guys, their faces painted blue and red resembling the British flag, stood up and started a rendition of “God Save The Queen.” Quickly, most of the stadium joined in with the impromptu choir. While I was pulling for the American Oudin, it was pretty cool seeing the majority of the upwards of 2,000 people in the crowd singing, and it never would have happened years ago.
To us, the premier match of the day outside of the main Rod Laver Arena was a 7 p.m. start between No. 18 Alexandr Dolgopolov and unranked hard-hitting Frenchman Gael Monfils. As we walked up to the stadium, we found the match before Dolgopolov/Monfils got a late start. Featured in the match was No. 13 Marin Cilic of Croatia. His opponent: Marinko Matosevic of Australia.
Australians support their own with a resounding passion. That’s very clear after watching Matosevic take on the favored Cilic in front of 6,000 fans. They also pull out all of the stops and do nothing short of the best when pulling for their own. Many packs of supporters throughout the crowd were dressed up in their Australian green and yellow in support of Matosevic. Any chance they got, they mocked Cilic, doing anything they could to get in his head.
While it didn’t work and Cilic won in straight sets, Matosevic and the crowd didn’t make it easy on him.
As Monfils and Dogopolov got underway, something happened that I never thought I would see in tennis. Monfils opened the match serving and serving hard. In just over one minute, Monfils hit the ball four times while Dolgopolov never made contact with the ball. It was four serves and four aces.
The younger generation again pulled out the new side of tennis, starting the wave in the first set. They put a twist on it though, making it a slow motion wave. The entire stadium went along, including Monfils.
When he went to get up from his courtside bench, he joined the crowd, standing up slowly and acting as if he was, too, participating in the slow motion wave.
The two battled back and forth and it was Monfils coming up with timely breaks to upset Dolgopolov in four sets.
Like I said above, going to a major tennis tournament, especially the Australian Open, was never something I thought I would do. But after 11 hours of heat, great tennis, upsets and sunburn, I can say it was worth it. Maybe next time it will be the U.S. Open. Think it could be interesting to see if there’s a difference in the fan support or the excitement of the crowds? I might have to find out!