Five of the six Swiss players who played at Wimbledon on Tuesday failed. The defeat was a bitter disappointment, especially for Belinda Bencic.
Viktorija Golubic is the only Swiss woman to survive the first round at Wimbledon.
It was almost as if the Swiss tennis miracle were experiencing its rebirth: Four Swiss men and women in the main Wimbledon tournament – and that, although Roger Federer is not at the tournament and will probably not return to the most important event for him . It was the first time since Wimbledon 2003 that eight Swiss had qualified.
But after just two days of the tournament, the Swiss feeling of exhilaration suffered a serious setback. Only Victorija Golubic is left of the octet. The 29-year-old from Zurich won her first round match against Germany’s Andrea Petkovic 6:4, 6:3. Wimbledon seems to suit her. A year ago she had reached the quarterfinals here. Only once in the four previous participations had she lost in the first round.
Golubic had already reached the semifinals in early June after beating British Emma Raducanu and Australian Ajla Tomljanovic in Nottingham. In Thursday’s second round, she will meet number 13 seeded Czech Barbora Krejcikova.
Bencic does not find the kick in Wimbledon
Once again, Wimbledon ended in disappointment for Belinda Bencic. The Swiss number 1 lost the continuation of the match, which was interrupted on Monday because of darkness, against the Chinese Qiang Wang in just 34 minutes 2: 6. Once again the tournament ended surprisingly early for the 2013 junior winner. “I continue to love weed, and the fact that things haven’t gone well for me here in recent years doesn’t necessarily mean that it won’t continue to do so in the future.”
Bencic made 45 so-called unforced errors in the match, which lasted two days. In the third set on Tuesday alone there were 18. For comparison: her Chinese opponent only underwent 18 in the entire match. But the injury that forced her to abandon the final in Berlin a week ago did not want to be used as an excuse. ‘She didn’t bother me. I never got into the game in the whole match. I have no explanation for that either.”
Bencic is now up next in the clay court tournament in Lausanne before switching to hard court in Prague in preparation for the North American hard court season. At the US Open, the highlight of the tournament series, she had been doing much better recently. A year ago she failed there in the quarter-finals due to eventual winner Raducanu.
The Zurich tennis miracle of Wimbledon ends
Despite losing to Greek Stefanos Tsitsipas, Alexander Ritschard put on a strong performance at Wimbledon.
After Stan Wawrinka, Henri Laaksonen, Marc-André Hüsler and Alexander Ritschard were also eliminated for the men. This ended the miracle of the two Zurich qualifiers Hüsler and Ritschard. Both made a respectable impression in their first games in a game of a main Grand Slam tournament.
The 26-year-old Hüsler caught up a 2-0 set deficit against the Frenchman Hugo Grenier before he finally lost (3:6, 6:7, 7:6, 6:2, 4:6). Ritschard, who is two years older than him, took the second place against the Greek top ten player Stefanos Tsitsipas (5) with a double break 4: 1 before the Greek still won the set thanks to a massive increase in performance.
Ritschard lived in the USA for several years and mainly played college tennis there. A blocked artery necessitated several operations and set him back a long way. He is only 188th in the ATP ranking. But the 184 ranks behind Tsitsipas were hardly ever seen in this match. In the end he lost the unequal duel 6:7, 3:6, 7:5, 4:6, but his performance didn’t just win him the respect of the Greeks.