Jankovic’s mixed emotions
Winning Wimbledon, it seems, does not cut any ice with the jobsworths of this world, as Jelena Jankovic discovered when the euphoria of her mixed doubles victory with Jamie Murray was punctured less than 12 hours after lifting her golden trophy.
Jankovic emerged from the Wimbledon Champions’ Dinner at The Savoy on Sunday night bleary-eyed but ready to enjoy the adulation of her Serbian homeland. And so, she queued happily for her flight at Heathrow’s Terminal 2 at 6am yesterday, clutching, as you might expect, a bag of rackets.
But, along with bottles of water, shampoo, guns and knives, tennis rackets are apparently classed as offensive weapons and Jankovic got no farther than the security check with her precious cargo. Even though she had helped a Briton to a first Wimbledon title in 20 years on the legendary Centre Court, her protests were to no avail.
“I’m a professional tennis player — I just won Wimbledon,” fellow passengers heard her cry. But rules is rules, young lady, and our new champion was parted from the tools of her trade.
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Nervous champion gets trousers in a twist
Then again, the euphoria of winning can be overwhelming, as Roger Federer discovered after taking his fifth consecutive title. Federer was all thumbs as he put on his Great Gatsby outfit of white jacket and white trousers — you know, those silly things that zip up the sides — to receive his trophy. So much so that The Insider’s man on Centre Court with the hawk eyes says that he put his trousers on back to front. Poor chap. The lesson here is: never wear comedy trousers, even for a sponsor.
ITV takes chequered flag ahead of rival
Not that Federer could claim to be top dog with viewers on Sunday. The stir around Lewis Hamilton had ITV reporting a 71 per cent jump in the audience for the British Grand Prix on last year. More than 5.3 million tuned in at its peak, but, more important, ITV won the shoot-out with the BBC, which was screening Wimbledon.
In the 30 minutes or so that the two sporting contests clashed head-to-head, ITV claims that it had 4.7 million viewers watching Hamilton in his fetching race suit to the Beeb’s 2.6 million viewers, obviously checking to see if Federer was still wearing his comedy trousers.
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- The scions of Silverstone are rubbing their hands as they prepare to count the loot from a sell-out on Sunday. Hamilton is thought to have put an extra 65,000 backsides on plastic seats over the weekend, worth about £3.5 million in turnstile takings.
Race day was an 85,000 sell-out, but how the Silverstone authorities must wish they could have packed in 120,000 people, as they did when Mansell-mania was at its peak in 1992. Unfortunately, their fear of traffic chaos if so many did turn up and the resulting wrath of Bernie Ecclestone, Formula One’s ruler, means that capacity at the dilapidated old circuit remains drastically reduced.