WIMBLEDON 2026 WRAP-UP

I know this is a week later than expected, but I had all those fabulous theater events to review that took precedence last week. But better late than never, right.

So, Wimbledon 2026 wrapped-up on July 12th. For the most part, the tournament was fun and intriguing as it went along. But the last weekend, which featured the Ladies’ and Gentlemen’s Finals, gutted me.

I’m absolutely crushed for Karolina Muchova, who lost the Final to her fellow Czech, Linda Nozkova. And then the very next day, the #2 men’s player in the world, Alexander Zverev, lost his Final to #1 Jannik Sinner. Both runners-up made matches of the Finals, but I’m almost as disappointed as they are.

Following are some of my thoughts over the fortnight, in order. I had done several tweets along the way, but not as many as I should have because, with the extreme time difference, (LA is 8 hours behind London,) I was always watching late in the day. You can always still read them on Twitter/X; my “handle” there is @MajorCelebrity.

And yes, for those of you who are also grammatically knowledgeable, the announcers’ habit of always leaving off the “ly”s at the end of words, did make me crazy! I already covered their adverb deficit in a column a couple of weeks ago, but it’s always worth a read, especially for those people who need that lesson. So here’s the link: itsnotaboutme.tv/news/karens-lessons-please-espn-buy-your-tennis-commentators-an-ly.

Okay, here are the rest of my random Wimbledon thoughts:

I found it a tad hard to listen to new studio Rece Davis’ “l” speech impediment.

Just when I thought that, even with his impediment, at least his hiring meant that we wouldn’t have to listen to creepy former host, Chris McKendry this year, there she was, calling the first match. Ugh. (She’s the one who always adds an “l” to the ends of “saw”s and “draw”s!

I love Mary Jo Fernandez, but her usually-gorgeous, thick hair looks weird. So I looked-up old pix of her to show Mr. X, and something hit me—she has always looked worried! I mean it—look her up yourselves.

I was worried that we were going to hear about Serena ad nauseam, (as we did for the first 2 days,) so thank goodness she lost in the…first round! Yay!

The giant glass behind the ESPN studio hosts is the cleanest, least reflective window I’ve ever seen! I’m impressed with the team that maintains it. Great job!

I can’t stand Naomi Osaka. Poor girl must be so insecure; she feels that she has to wear crazy outfits to get attention. The chair referee had to move her discarded outfit that she was so rude to leave all over her chairs, so the ball kids could fall on it! I know she’s admitted she has mental health issues, (who doesn’t, actually?,) but she should not subject everyone to her nuttiness.

What the heck happened to Caroline Wozniacki??? She looks like a sixty-year-old #skeleton!!!

I really like Malika Andrews, but what is she doing there? It’s just confusing me. I’ve seen her do only basketball before, so this will take some getting used to.

Chinese player Wu Yibing did great against Novak. He was impressive.

Sam Querry has quickly become the best commentator on there. Great voice, pretty intelligent, and he even said that Taylor Fritz looked “resplendent” in his crazy new outfit. (In case you were lucky enough to miss it, it was a white suit jacket, a long white tuxedo scarf, and…tear-away pants! What an idiot.) Sam also said the clever, “Working on the tan during this match, with the sleeveless,” regarding player Miomir Kecmanović ’s shirt.

Meanwhile, Caroline Wozniacki is the worst one, with her weak voice.

Speaking of Miomir Kecmanović, how kind was he to stay at the tourney the day after his five-setter against Sinner, to watch his “lucky loser”* pal play his own match? Most tennis players are on the next plane as soon as they lose! (A “lucky loser” is a competitor who fails to advance during the qualifying rounds of a tournament but is given a spot in the main draw because another player withdraws before the tournament begins.)

So glad to be rid of McKendry as the host, but she may be even worse as the play-by-play person on some matches. She talked through the entirety of one of Iga Swiatek’s games!!!

And ESPN kept making us miss matches to show us Serena Williams walking! They’re making the entire tourney about her!!!

I feel for #4 Ben Shelton to have lost a heartbreaker in the first round, but he needs to stop yelling an uber-loud “A” every time he hits the ball. It’s soooo distracting to his opponent. Not fair. Or nice. He should be docked a point every time he does that. At one point, commentator James Blake said, “He’s going for a screaming winner.” Exactly.

ESPN announced the wrong time for Serena’s match, (which I’m sure they did on purpose, to get her fans to tune in early,) and then the channel kept trying to rush the other matches. When eventual finalist Alexander Zverev got to two sets to one in his matches, they kept announcing, “Only one more set till Serena,” totally minimizing Zverev’s opponent, who could have won the fourth set, thus making the match go the full five sets! And they did so repeatedly!!! So rude.

I like Patrick McEnroe, but how can he not know the correct word here is “hallowed???” He declared, “She’s back. On the hollowed grounds of centre court.” So he thinks there’s a hole in the court, instead of being revered!!! Why are all these people so stupid???

One of the commentators said that Serena being back, (which turned-out to be for just one match—she was a complete and utter bust,) is an “oh so pleasant surprise.” Speak for yourself, John. It’s disgusting that ESPN made the entire first week of the tournament about her! There were two hundred fifty-five other competitors in just the singles draws, each with an interesting story, and they were all being ignored. And Serena was back only to show off her weight loss!!! How much is that drug company paying her to go back??? Horrible.

They say how all the players are so excited about her comeback, but they all are basically forced to say those things. If they said they don’t give a fig, they would be iced out.

So a beyond-major congrats to young Aussie Maya Joint for that amazing win over Serena Williams! You rock! And could Serena have been any less gracious in defeat? I think not. And she was so rude that not only did she not congratulate nor praise Maya, but she refused to do the mandatory post-match presser! That behavior was disgusting.

I hate when the winners, like Naomi Osaka, say, “Good match,” to the person they just beat! It’s beyond pat. There are soooo many other things to say, even if the two competitors had never met before! How about, “Nice to meet you,” “I hope to see you again,” “You play well,” “Nice dress,” etc.

And Naomi said in one of her post-match interviews that she was glad she won because the next day was her young daughter’s birthday, and she “didn’t want to make her get on a plane on her birthday.” Is she an idiot??? She wouldn’t have to fly home because she lost! She could stay in London an extra day and give her daughter a fabulous b-day to remember!!!

We were subjected to yet another of Serena’s lies! (Remember when she said she couldn’t play because she had stepped on broken glass outside of a restaurant in Munich? There was no record of the incident nor any images, and the eatery was never named. Nor sued! Everyone in the know feels it was all a big fat lie so she would have an excuse to not play in the next tourney, where she had been disqualified in the semis for her behavior the year before!!! Look it up—it’s a fascinating tale.) This time the fabrication was that she injured her knee at the end of the 1st set against Maya Joint, (so she now had an excuse for her loss.) During the match, she never once touched her knee, called a trainer, or looked like anything was wrong physically. Am I the only one who’s sick of her??? Even Chris Fowler and Andy Roddick said they didn’t notice anything wrong during the match.

I don’t dislike Coco Gauff anymore, but I almost started to again when she said “comrididdie” for “camaraderie!!!” It took me a while to try to figure-out what she was even trying to say! And she wasn’t tripping over the word—she said it like she meant it! Oysh.

Very young American, Iva Jovic, is the most mature and speaks the best and says the most intelligent things.

They need to tell us who is in the players’ boxes already! They rarely do, which is just nuts, especially when the camera is showing them every other second.

How could Andy Roddick and Rece Davis see this pic of Learner Tien, and not see his hospital bracelet and IV??? They just kept making jokes about how much he was eating! It’s major news when a player is in the hospital shortly after competing!!!

I’m very ashamed of John McEnroe and Chris Fowler for how much they were making fun of British player Jan Choinski! They were chuckling about that he’s #100 in the world. How about that he’s getting to play at his country’s home tourney, which is the most prestigious in the world, without even needing a wild card or to play qualifying matches?! How about mention that??? They should have been lauding him to the max! And they were dissing him because he was playing American Francis Tiafoe. Disgusting behavior from them.

Studio host Malika Andrews said, “There’s no better way to celebrate the holiday weekend than that,” about watching the Williams sisters! Is she out of her mind??? I used to love her, and then she was changing all that in just those few days. (But luckily for us, Serena dropped out of the doubles, I’m assuming so it would look like she was telling the truth about her aforementioned “knee injury.”)

Now I love young Jakub Menšík for being so happy for Grigor Dmitrov who just beat him when Jakub was the seeded player!!!

Rece David just told us who Novak Djokovic “is playing in the next round,” even though he had not played today’s match yet! That totally ignored his opponent for today!!!

As Wimbledon went on, one commentary duo emerged as the best for me. Sam Querrey and Mike Monaco both have great voices and speak well and intelligently. And are interesting and entertaining without pushing. Sam made Mr. X and me laugh several times, by simply being honest.

But right after I wrote that note, Sam got something majorly wrong. As they played a video of some of the players in the security line at the practice courts, he said of Coco Gauff, “Coco is”waiting her turn in line, she’s not cutting.” But…the video shows she and her party totally cut the line!!! They just went ahead of everyone without permission!!! It looked like they had no plans to do the right thing, at all!!!

Every sport needs to have a website, preferably public, where the athletes say their own names a couple of times, so that the broadcasters will know how to pronounce them! I don’t mean this as a diss; I’m only trying to be helpful. (And let’s face it—it’s a brilliant idea!)

Back to the selfishness of Serena Williams. She screwed her own sister, plus a second player who could have competed alongside Venus in the Doubles, as Leylah Fernandez did last year. Serena truly thinks it’s all about herself. And…she took soooo much attention away from the entirety of the tournament from the get-go! Only two good things came out of having Serena attempt a comeback at Wimbledon. The first is that Maya Joint gets to now say that she beat Serena Williams, which she never thought she’d even have the opportunity to do. Second is that we got to see her lose in the first round, which was a pleasure. But she’s totally lying about her knee. And, because sooo many people didn’t believe her tale, she had to withdraw from Doubles, to not look like the big fat liar that she is. Even the commentators, who always have to make believe they’re in her corner, have all said that they didn’t see anything happen to her knee in that match.

Sadly, (to me,) Malika Andrews kept mispronouncing gorgeous Matteo Berrettini’s last name. She kept putting an “n” in the wrong place, saying “BerreNtini” instead of “Berrettini” with no “N” in it! I loved her doing basketball, but not so much for tennis. She seems like she doesn’t know that much about it. Shame.

I’m happy for new Filipina star Alex Eala, but in an on-court post-match interview, her supposedly improvised line about her “ruffled socks and chubby cheeks” as a little girl sounded so pat and rehearsed. She even repeated it twice in that same interview, and again in the studio the next day! She needs to get some new material already. It sounded like she read that about herself in an article, and decided to use the line herself whenever she can. (And by the way—what little girl did not have those two things?!)

But I love her hair, both the off-the-court wearing it down, and that adorbs compartmentalized ponytail on the court.

Speaking of hairstyles, I just finally figured something out—ESPN probably doesn’t have hair people for their “talent,” so Malika Andrews had to give up her classy and fun basketball work ‘dos, and go with the not-great braids, (pieces of which looked out of place for the entire fortnight,) because like me, she has no hair talent herself! That has got to be it!

Look at the difference in kindness and graciousness between the two American girls who played each other and the two Czech ones who did the same in the Quarter-Finals. Shame on the US ones, who always make believe they’re such good friends!

I’m sick for World #1 Aryna Sabalenka to have been ousted in the Quarter-final. I think her issue is that she just cares too much and is too desperate to win.

As I’ve mentioned, I always write good things about Malika Andrews. But even though I’m not a fan of Naomi Osaka, Malika really needs her to stop mispronouncing her name. She keeps saying “NIomi” instead of the correct “NAomi!” Malika is better than that, so can someone at ESPN please correct her already?!

This match was very exciting—a pair of Wild Cards met on Centre Court in the Round of 16!!! Wow. Grigor Dmitrov and Brit Arthur Fery. They both have such interesting stories that are waaaay too long to tell her, so, if you’re a fan or sports, comebacks, and the like, look them up when you get a sec.

The most honest thing anyone said during the entire fortnight was, “This sport is really rough,” said by Mary Jo Fernandez matter-of-factly after Coco Gauff’s opponent beat her after Coco was just two points away from the win.

When Mr. X heard play-by-play man, Brit Jason Goodall, he asked, entirely seriously, “Is his mic was off?” I call him “The Whisperer.”

After making it into the Semis, Alexander Zverev gave the most charming post-match speech ever!!! The British interviewer told him, “You’re a gent, and you’ve got a beautiful way with words, as well.” I’ve never heard him tell any other player something like that. I concur with it all.

And that’s a wrap for my Wimbledon 2026 wrap-up. Much more tennis to come during next months’ US Open!