Monday 7 July 2008

Bed called at 2nd rain delay

Last night was frustrating as the only channel broadcasting the Wimbledon men's final was Dubai Sport whose commentary is in Arabic. That was not too bad when the volume was loud enough to hear line calls etc. but very frustrating when the 1st rain delay came in the 3rd set... The covers went on and I had know idea if it was a shower or possibly a longer delay as I couldn't understand what they were saying. As they repeated the previous day's womens final, I switched to BBC news to try to get info. I then spent the next hour flicking back and forth to try and catch the restart, which I did. I was on the edge of the seat throughout the end of the 3rd set and all of the 4th. As a Rafa fan, I thought it was all over when he lost the opportunity to win the championship and the 4th set went to Federer. Still on the edge of my seat for the beginning of the 5th, although the eyelids were dropping due to the time difference, I was beginning to think Federer would win and... it rained again! It was now after 11pm here in Muscat, having got up at 6am and not knowing how long this delay would be, I followed the call of the bed and missed the end of the match. This morning, at a too early 5.40am, I switched on BBC news to get the result. YEAH! Rafa won! The report makes the last set sound amazing, as the score probably shows... I can't watch it as the clips on BBC Sport online are blocked - joys of living in a dictatorship (although very benign one) I guess. Shall have to try YouTube or somewhere else now I guess.