Sod it

I put the French Open tennis on at lunchtime to follow Andy Murray's hopeful progress, and he duly despatched plucky young Croatian Marin Cilic fairly comfortably in three sets. The real story was to come though - Senor Nadal, red-hot favourite and unbeaten at Roland Garros, was a set down to Sweden's Robin Soderling (above - phwooar!). And blow me down if, after an enthralling afternoon's viewing, the impressively-muscled Swede didn't dump poor Rafa out of the tournament.

The top seed was some way off top form but "Sod" (as the onscreen graphic rather unfairly referred to him) was blasting winners from all angles in what must have been the game of his life. Unfortunately, any enjoyment that derives from watching the French Open is tempered somewhat by the crowd.

Now, the French have many qualities as a race, but politeness and humility are some way down the list. Any player at Roland Garros who dares to question a line call is subjected to a barrage of whistles. Ok so that's pretty rude, but at least it means the crowd don't like any interruptions to their beloved tennis, right? Er... except that on several occasions today they were performing Mexican waves (an irritating manoeuvre at the best of times), and even though the players were ready they refused to stop until the wave had made the desired number of circuits, and not a moment before. Quelle hypocrisie!

A blind person could probably guess the Grand Slam venue purely from listening to the crowd noises, without needing to listen for actual words. Wimbledown crowds do that terribly British style of polite guffaw whenever something mildly amusing (pigeon landing on the net, line judge getting twatted by a 100mph serve, etc) happens, which must legally last for no more than five seconds. Spectators at the US Open whoop and yell unintelligible things between every point (probably). And the French find any excuse to jeer and whistle if they don't like a player, which applies to anybody from outside of France really.

I've looked this up and because I studied the language at degree level and lived in Strasbourg for 6 months, it's not at all racist for me to have an almighty pop at the Frenchies. Think of it as a form of tough love. Memo to Mr Murray: next time they try a Mexican wave while you're waiting to serve, fire off a "mistimed" one right into the middle of them. It'd be as satisfying to us as any Grand Slam you might win in the future.