By Alix Ramsay

 

We live in an ever changing world, one that is dominated by what Harold Wilson, then the Prime Minister of Great Britain, once called the “white heat” of technology.

Admittedly, Harold was speaking in 1963 when the latest, cutting edge invention was the push-button phone and the Americans were attempting to put a man on the moon using little more than a car battery, three rubber bands and several rolls of aluminium foil, but the times, they were still a’changin’.

In Belgium just the other day, the locals laid out “texting lanes” around the city of Antwerp so that anyone with their head buried in their smart phone can stumble, uninterrupted, around the place and avoid bumping into innocent shoppers and bystanders. They are damned clever, these Belgiques but, then again, their country is so small, they have always had to be creative. After all, they gave us the Brussels sprout simply because they do not have room for grown-up cabbages.

In about 100 years or so, the human race will have developed a second set of eyes on the top its head in order to see where it is going while it fiddles with its “devices” and plays with its apps.

These days, you are not worth knowing if you do not have an app and in the world of social media, nothing of import happens unless it has a hashtag. You could run down the street handing out wads of tenners and nine-tenths of the bystanders would only know about it by following the hashtag #freemoney on Twitter. Presumably, those born into the technological generation have eschewed pillow talk and in the throes of passion, Tweet that the deed has been done before thinking of asking their partners: “how was it for you?”

But what has all of this to do with tennis, I hear you sigh. Well, to keep pace with the digital age, the ATP has revamped its website and launched it, to many fanfares and hurrahs, on Monday. They sort of launched it, quietly, over the weekend to much swearing and grumping in the Queen’s Club press room. A gaggle of middle aged hacks scratched what was left of their hair and tried to navigate their way around the new-fangled font of all tennis knowledge. And they all got lost. Half of the site was not working and the half that was was doing its damnedest to keep its stats away from prying eyes.

Ah, Queen’s. Here we are again. This year, the tournament has been upgraded to 500 status and, oh my, are they pleased about it. The players get heaps more prize money (an increase of €300,000 for the winner, up from €90,000 last summer), the draw is studded with superstars (nine of the world’s top 15 are here) and place is knee-deep in tanked-up toffs.

Security has been upgraded, too, and if the blokes in ill-fitting suits had their way, we would all be banished from the grounds in order to make it super safe. All bags are to be checked on entry. No, you cannot take the most obvious route into the club, you must walk half way around London in order to join a queue on the other side of the building before you can get to your place of work. Heaven forfend that you should use the entrance at the back of the media room and walk the 30 yards or so to your desk. No, that entrance is for kitchen staff only. Media verboten.

Just a word to the wise (and the wealthy). Should you come to Queen’s for the tennis and sit down to one of the eye-wateringly expensive lunches, be advised that the veggies you are about to tuck into have been prepped in the loading bay by that kitchen staff entrance. They are prepped next to the bins and in the overpowering pong of rotting rubbish emanating from the garbage truck that is parked there from morning to close of play. Bon appetite.

Of course, if you happen to wander into the club via the TV entrance, you are not subject to a bag check. In fact, you are barely subject to a check of any kind. Clearly, the BBC, the rights holders, have paid for the privilege of bringing anything they like into the building, be it a ticking bomb or be it their sandwiches in a Tupperware box. That is real power.

But anyway, back to the new ATP website. It is clearly designed for those with tablets and androids as it is built for swiping and prodding. Alas, for those of us Luddites in the press bunker who work on laptops, it resembles a bizarre Heath Robinson contraption – everything is 47 clicks away from where you would expect it to be.

A simple head-to-head enquiry involves five more processes than on the old site, a player’s career history at a specified tournament is locked away in the vaults of the system, never to be seen again, and his activity over the past couple of years takes a good 20 minutes to find.  If those jewel thieves who drilled their way into a Hatton Garden safety deposit vault a couple of months back could do likewise to the new ATP website and release its secrets to the world, the International Tennis Writers’ Association would be eternally grateful.

Of course, the frustration only starts when you get on to the site – and that is not easy. So many bits keep falling off the new design that it is forever being mended. And when they are mending it, the same error message fills the screen: “Bad Gateway”. It sounds like a small town in Germany.

The ATP, of course, are awfully proud of their new toy and, being eternally optimistic, are cheerily asking us to find bits that we like on the site. So far, and after extensive research, TenniShorts can safely announce that the one improvement is the audio clip of the players saying their own names. Djoko is his usual, puffed-up self: “This is Novak Djokovic”. Andy Murray sounds like a man at his wits end, fighting with an automated telephone exchange: “State you name,” it intones. “Andy Murray”, “I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you. State you name” “Andy Murray” “I’m sorry…” “ANDY MURRAY!!!” “Your call is important to us. Please try again later. Goodbye.” As for Stan the Man, he sounds like he is still out on the razz, celebrating his French Open win.

But pity poor old David Ferrer – he is mute. No audio. No Spanish lilt. Just his name spelled out phonetically: Fuhrer. For some, like the goose-stepping younger members of Britain’s royal family, this might seem like a jolly nickname but for a gentle soul like David, it does seem a little harsh.

And then there is Rafa.

Try clicking this link and then click on the speaker icon. No one can roll his arse like Raf (if you see what I mean). He may now be the world No.10 after a very ordinary clay court season, he may not be the player he once was but no one, absolutely no one, can say Rafa Nadal like him. In the white heat of the technological age, Rafa is still No.1.