Tennis fans gathered on Wimbledon’s famous grass mound spent much of Thursday speculating how Henman Hill – more recently known as Murray Mound – might be renamed if the newest British star, Arthur Fery, continues his meteoric rise.
As Fery-mania builds in SW19 and across the UK in advance of Fery’s hotly anticipated semi-final match against the German No 2 seed, Alexander Zverev, on Friday, they have eschewed suggestions such as Fery Field to alight on one name: Arthur’s Seat.
“There’s literally nothing that begins with ‘f’,” lamented Natalie Humphreys, who had travelled from Glasgow to attend the championships. “But could we make it Arthur’s Seat? It’s such a good one!”
Humphreys was among thousands of tennis fans enjoying the added buzz around Wimbledon’s grounds after Fery’s unexpected victory on Wednesday.
“We’re big Murray fans, because we’re from Scotland, so it’s actually amazing to see someone British coming through and winning again,” said Humphreys. “He’s 23 so he’s a bit older than a lot of the new people coming up, and it’s almost like he’s got the maturity that younger players haven’t … so he seems to just be sailing through. It’s so exciting.”
Humphreys and her partner, Kai, had just returned from seeing Scotland play against Morocco in the World Cup in Boston. “We’re having such a sporting summer, living our best lives,” she said, adding that she was hoping it would continue with Fery facing off against Novak Djokovic in Sunday’s final.
Sarah Cadwallader, from Dorset, and her mother, Jane Collishaw, from Frome, Somerset, had secured ballot tickets for Thursday and considered whether to extend their visit to soak up the festive vibes on Friday.
“I did say to Mum: ‘Should we give up our hotel and camp out tonight so that we can sit here and watch it?’, but I think you’d need a tent tonight,” said Cadwallader.
Cadwallader had phoned her mother on Wednesday to tell her how gripped she was by the match that propelled Fery through to the quarter-final. “[She said] ‘I haven’t moved for three and a half hours’, and then I said I hadn’t either, and at the end it had been nearly five hours. I looked at my watch and I hadn’t got up. It’s been amazing.”
She first saw Fery at the Queen’s Club tennis tournament in June – “I’d never heard of him before, to be honest” – and was thrilled to see him reappear at Wimbledon.
At the quarter-final on Wednesday, Fery was buoyed up by the support of a rapturous home crowd, who roared in celebration as he won set after set and cheered him on with chants of “Let’s go Arthur, let’s go” and “Here comes the Fery”.
Collishaw envisaged a repeat of the vibrant atmosphere on Friday. “The way he’s playing and the confidence he’s got, I don’t see why he couldn’t do it. He’s going to have the crowd behind him as well, so I think that’s going to make all the difference.”
Joseph Ellis, from Barnes, south-west London, was delighted to see a British player make it so far. “Especially as a wild card. You wouldn’t have ever expected it, but it’s very cool,” he said.
He also backed Fery to make it to the final. “It’ll be harder than his other games, obviously, but I reckon he’s playing well. He can carry that momentum forward, or he can give us a good game at least.”
Leon Smith, the head of men’s tennis at the Lawn Tennis Association, said Fery’s progress was “outstanding”.
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He said although Fery had had some recent successes in the Queen’s Club championship and the Australian Open, “nobody was going to predict a semi-final run, and maybe more”.
The crowd support would pose an advantage, and one that Fery was good at mobilising, Smith said. “There’s going to be times he’s feeling it physically. It’s amazing what adrenaline can do when you hear the noise of Centre Court – you go again, find a third wind.”
He added that Fery’s background in US collegiate tennis was something the LTA was increasingly encouraging young British talent to pursue, to the extent that it was now the background of most players. The slower route has become more of an option for young players, since careers tend to be longer.
Simon Hayes, the chief executive of Sport England, said he hoped Fery’s Wimbledon run would have the same impact on tennis participation as the success of England’s women’s football team had on “inspir[ing] a generation of girls to play football”. However, he said it was important that moments like “Fery-mania” were used to expand “opportunity and affordable access” across the country.
Jason Goodall, an ESPN tennis commenter and former professional player, said Fery’s Wimbledon success was “one of the truly great sports stories”, capable of inspiring future generations to pick up a racket, while its David and Goliath narrative “transcends tennis”.
However, he said the forthcoming match against Zverev on Friday “couldn’t be a stiffer test”. “He’s very much the underdog going into that match,” he said.
Goodall has discussed Fery with Tim Henman, whom he formerly coached. “Tim’s just as impressed as I am in how he’s played,” he said.
Yet he thinks talk of renaming Henman Hill Arthur’s Seat might be somewhat premature. “It’s a big leap to be a Tim Henman,” he said. “There’s a lot of work and a lot of time that will go in between now and achieving all that Tim did. But it’s a possibility. You’re in the conversation if you can keep working hard, and [Fery] seems to have a great attitude … he’s got a great chance.”
