It has become a bit of a cliché to refer to one’s passage through life as ‘a journey’, but truly there is no more apt way to describe the lot of an official Championships ball.
Every single fluorescent-yellow spherical item of ammunition used by a player – and 54,250 are used every Wimbledon – not only flies 6,600 miles to SW19 from the Slazenger factory in Bataan in the Philippines, but also undergoes a rigorous hand testing for bounce, weight and compression. That is quite some back story.
And yet there is no such thing as individual character for a tennis ball, no opportunities to be a rogue or project some personality on court. Each ball must conform to strict rules set by the International Tennis Federation. For example, a ball must bounce between 135 and 147cm after being dropped on to concrete from a height of 100 inches. It must measure between 6.54 and 6.86cm in diameter and weigh between 56 and 59.4g.
Without the Slazenger Wimbledon ball – or all 54,250 of them - there would be no Championships. It is salutary to think that the humble ball at the heart of the ‘Tennis in an English Country Garden’, particularly beloved by the police sniffer dogs, is in fact a composite of materials from 11 countries and four continents: clay from South Carolina in the United States, silica from Greece, magnesium carbonate from Japan, zinc oxide from Thailand, sulphur from South Korea, rubber from Malaysia, petroleum naphthalene from China, glue from the Philippines and wool from New Zealand (which is woven into felt in Gloucestershire, England).
It is an extraordinarily involved manufacture for a competitive lifespan of seven or nine games on the hallowed grass of Wimbledon. While it is impossible to do a point-by-point trail in a ball’s Championship ‘journey’, we can track its movements quite closely. Here goes.
A ball arrives at the All England Club from the Philippines via Nottingham in a sealed tube of three, in a box containing 24 such tins, in one of three deliveries throughout The Championships. The balls are stored in the Ball Distribution Office in Centre Court, or in its overflow cupboard. They are kept at a temperature of 68 degrees Farenheit and safeguarded by Brian Mardling, the connoisseurial ball distribution manager who can tell at a glance and with a quick squeeze how many games a ball has endured.
By 10.30am, the day’s balls are delivered by trolley to the practice courts and to the Championship Balls front office close to the Referee’s office and Ball Boys and Girls control desk.
At 11.15am, the captains of the ball boy and girl teams operating on each outside court picks up a drum of balls ready for start of play at 11.30am. The captain of teams on Centre and No. 1 Courts collect their allocation at 12.45pm. On average, they take 22 tins per outside court and 24 to the main Show Courts.
On court, the drum of balls is dropped into a metal container to keep them in optimum condition. The first two cans are opened by the umpire. Only six balls are ever in play.
Balls are changed after the first seven games (to allow for warm-up), then after every nine games. Old balls go back into their tins – logo faded, colour dimmed by the ferocity of hitting - and into a green bag under the umpire’s chair. At the end of the match, the team captain returns the bag to the front office and new balls are exchanged for old.
And what is the fate, you might wonder, of the one ball we have been tracking?
The very next day it is sold at the Used Balls kiosk next to Court 14 at a cost of £3 for a tin of three balls; £5 for six. There is plenty of life left in the ball. It is quite a thrill to take home a ball that has been touched only by the umpire (or line judge) who opened the tins, the team of ball boys and girls and either two or four of the best players in the world. You could be playing with a ball that was struck by Rafa or Andy, Serena or Maria. Some of their magic may rub off...
The proceeds from the sale of used Championships balls are donated to The School’s Tennis programme delivered by the Tennis Foundation. Last year’s donation was £15,000.
