Because I've not been able to play golf due to "lockdown," I've been watching both the track cycling and tennis on the Eurosport TV channels this afternoon. Despite the Covid restictions, the cycling doesn't seem that different. Of course there are no spectators, but the centre of the track is as it usually is. Apart from the small hospitality area are not being used due to distancing, it's full of the teams and their support mechanics etc. So looks no different. The coverage of the races seems the same as little of the spectator area ever gets shown. There's still the music and there is some noise, mainly from those in the middle of the track area. The only difference is there's not a full medal ceremony, the riders stand on the podium, the winners are announced, the national anthem played and photographs taken. It's a case of, "pick up your own medal and your bunch of flowers off the table on your way up to the podium." The tennis was quite different. It's from Linz in Austria, part of the minor WTA tour. No big names.I think it's a struggle to keep these events going, given that the prize money has been reduced by 70% because of Covid. Again an empty stadium but with no noise. It took me a moment to understand what was going on, I could see and hear the umpire calling out the scores and the line judges calling out the faults, but there were none. It was all being done with Hawkeye. I'm assuming there's someone in a booth with a microphone looking at monitors and calling out "fault" when the system picks it up. There's no usual six ball boys/girls either, just three adults who were managing just as well. So just six people in all, in the arena, apart from a dozen player support people in the stand. This may be an indicator of what will happen after Covid. The matches are running smoothly with Hawkye, no desputed calls. No "Chalk flew up!" "I want the referee!" dramas. No chance of any line judge nodding off, as has happened on occasions at big tournaments over the years. So no appeals, or waiting to see it on the big screen, with the spectators clapping as they watch the ball on the screen as it heads towards the line and the subsequent cheers or groans. As all these tournaments can use Hawkeye now, line judges are actually really superfluous and doing without dozens of them at tournaments could be a big saving that might be considered attractive. But it wouldn't be the same.
"Hawkeye" is a system of a number of cameras focused on the lines of a tennis court linked to a computer and screens. Different countries probably have alternative names for the same sort of system. From this it's possible to tell whether a ball is "in or out." In tennis. As long as a part of a ball actually touches a line, even if it's just a couple of millimetres, the ball is "in." It's far more accurate than the human eye and can not be challenged. A simulated digital re-play is shown on a big screen in the arena for the players, umpire and spectators to see, when it's called into action. It's been in use for quite a number of years now. Trivia. Conversely, if an American Football player's foot touches the side line by even as much as a couple of millimetres, he's "out of bounds."
Fair enough, but did we need to know? When things don't interest me on a messageboard, like most, I just scroll down.
Something else which struck me as odd eith the rennisd. Usually, at the back end of the court against the back wall there are three chairs for the three line judges at that end. They rarely sit on them but they are always there.. For many years now in those tournaments that have a lot of advertising, there's a U shaped fixture up to nine inches high and about 3ft for each side that surrounds each of the chairs. This always has advertising on the three sides. They are rarely out of sight of the TV cameras. I guess the justification for their use, would be to stop the unwanted balls discarded by players before a serve, from rolling under the chairs which might take the ball boys/girls longer to retrieve. Of course today, there are no line judges, so no chairs, but the three sided advertising boards were there, around "nothing,." just lined up in their usual positions. I guess the contract for the advertising was paid for before the Covid situation, so they had to be provided.
Riley, even though I hate the reason, I enjoy the telling. You make the change in Tennis matches interesting. As for Hawkeye, I guessed it had to do with cameras, simply because my very first camera was a Brownie Hawkeye. I sort of enjoy watching Tennis, but Baseball is my favorite sport and most men find it boring. Too slow they say. I never watch Football. Seeing grown men leap into a pile makes no sense to me. LOL No, you really didn't care to know that!
"Hawkeye" provided some amusement today. It's not uncommon for the server to be unhappy with their ball toss. They throw it up and then catch it, say "Sorry" then throw it up again and serve. it happens several times in a match. Today a player did just that and must have just stepped over the baseline as she retrieved the ball to start again. A disembodied loud Hawkeye voice shouted "Foot fault!" which startled everyone. I do watch some of the baseball, but I wouldn't count it amongst my favourite sports. But I do like to watch the NFL games. Our youngest son played tight end for an amateur team between the ages of twenty and thirty. My wife and I went to many of the games in which he played around the midlands and the north of England. It's a game where you need to know the rules to enjoy it properly. You also need a bit of periferal vision, it's as much about what other players are doing as the one with the ball. My game was squash, I played for a club team in the North West Counties Leagues for twelve years. Over time it's become more watchable on TV with the "see-through" glass courts.
We like to think we invented the game here in the UK, so it's always been "football." The first game played under the rules was in Cambridge in 1848. But as a game in this country, records go back to the eighth century. Then there is American football or NFL football, or to use an old fashioned term gridiron. First played in 1869. These distinctions need to be progressively made clear as "proper football" is a growing sport in the USA particularly amonst kids of both sexes. Football is also an Olympic sport. American fooball is not.
Why? Football is our game. It's played with a round ball. Your game is a version of Rugby. In factfootball as we know it is international. In every European language, Football means "football." In fact all the words used in the game in any language are English. i.e. "corner, free kick, off-side, penalty, goal kick etc., are called in English, not Spanish, French, German or whatever.
Many Americans like rugby, they do have teams in the States. In the game they hit as hard as they do in the NFL, but without pads or helmets. Women play the game too, up to international level.
Football is the word for soccer in Dutch. Rugby is the word we use for rugby. The dutch always have to be different, don’t they.
