Tennis is a beautiful game. Federer's game is like someone reciting a beautiful poem or the sensation of cutting through a piece of soft cheese. The sheer force of Nadal's game is like watching a cyclone blow herself out, is so awe inspiring. When Djokovic plays, its like learning a lesson in 'how not to give up'. No matter who his opposition is, irrespective how down he is, he will hold his end and rise.
Then why in the name of Federer's poetry, Nadal's cyclonic game and Djokovic's 'never say die' attitude does this game require ball kids to be responsible for their towels.
No other game, not test cricket which gets played over a 5 day period, not football where the pace of the game is, if anything more tempest prone than tennis is and not any other game which duration-wise and pace-wise falls between these two games involves someone waiting around with a towel for the players to wipe their sweat on perhaps to feel a little more comfortable carrying on with the game or just to get a breather between the points.
Perhaps the person carrying the towel around doesn't mind it at all and others would kill to be in a position to just hold that sweat laden towel. It is not about how crazy it is to be able to have the 'privilage' of holding it, but the question is how right is it?
To me it feels like a form of slave system, a surfdom, a form of subservience of the proletarait to the bourgeoisie. And this is not even mentioning the reaction of the players when they give into their emotions as the game progresses. The towel is thrown back, the ball kids shouted at for the towel to be brought quickly. Goodness knows how much of germs are making merry in the towel that the kids handle with bare hands. And even once I haven't caught any player ever muttering a 'thank you' to the kids for this thankless job. Shouldn't that be the natural reaction to someone who is doing something probably their family member wouldn't do? or has the system of ball kids handling the towel become so ingrained in the psyche of the players that they just take it for granted?
Sweating is natural while playing the game, play on with the sweat dripping, it wouldn't make a Federer any less appealing to his admirer or the game less interesting to a connoisseur. His game will be admired irrespective of how much sweat he is covered in. And if it's a question of comfort the player can always walk to the seat which in any case would be less than 20 feet away and towel himself between games.
And if one sweats like a 'blowing cyclone' he could just wipe his face on the wrist band like a doubles player would as they usually avoid using the services of a ball kid for fear of getting the towels mixed up with the partner's.
If a wrist band doesn't work, know what, a serviette pinned to the T should do the trick.. Anyways it's time people gave this a thought as it's just not nice and reeks of something more disgusting than the hard-shed sweat.
