'%20x='0'%20y='0'%20height='100%25'%20width='100%25'%20%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20xlink%3Ahref='data:image/jpg;base64,/9j/2wBDAAYEBQYFBAYGBQYHBwYIChAKCgkJChQODwwQFxQYGBcUFhYaHSUfGhsjHBYWICwgIyYnKSopGR8tMC0oMCUoKSj/2wBDAQcHBwoIChMKChMoGhYaKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCj/wgARCAAFAAoDASIAAhEBAxEB/8QAFQABAQAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAX/xAAVAQEBAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACA//aAAwDAQACEAMQAAAAuQQ0/8QAIhAAAgIBAgcBAAAAAAAAAAAAAQMCBAUAEwcVFiIjUmJz/9oACAEBAAE/AOk7Tt2s3MMnWq7eTCpqM4mAmfEBKR9z36zXDW+jMX0qz1ULW9kIjlv1+uv/xAAXEQADAQAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAQIh/9oACAECAQE/AJWn/8QAFxEAAwEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAECMv/aAAgBAwEBPwC8o//Z'%3E%3C/image%3E%3C/svg%3E)
Aryna Sabalenka's semifinal bout at Wimbledon with 13th-seeded Amanda Anisimova earlier in Thursday (July 10) saw the tennis community band together to speak out against Wimbledon's scoreboard system. The score bar on the Centre Court had enough space to fit in the American's nationality, which has added fuel to fans' previous complaints about the English Major slashing the players' names.
Sabalenka began her bid to reach her first-ever Wimbledon final in less than ideal fashion on Thursday, dropping the opening set 4-6 after missing four break points on Anisimova's serve. Although the Belarusian clawed back into the match in the second set, a controversy midway through caught the fans' attention when the World No. 1's nationality was not shown on the scoreboard during the encounter.
Amanda Anisimova, meanwhile, had her last name and her nationality well fit within her section of the score bar where the players' names appear. This irked quite a few tennis fans on X (formerly Twitter), one of whom cited an example from Novak Djokovic's Round-of-16 outing against Alex de Minaur at SW19 to express their discontent.
Trending
"Is there any reason why they're showing Anisimova's country in the scoreboard when they haven't been doing this all tournament??? See the Novak demon game where it didn't have it.... strange," the fan wrote on X (formerly Twitter).
Another fan, meanwhile, inferred that Wimbledon wanted to show their solidarity to Ukraine, considering how the tennis federation of the Russian and Belarusian players on both pro tours was banned in 2022 for starting an invasion of their neighbouring country.
"Making it clear it's not two Russians in their semis," the fan claimed.
One more fan asserted that including the country abbreviations in the scoreboard warranted criticism.
"I don’t like the sudden country code there," they wrote.
A few others critiqued Wimbledon's inability to display full last names on their score bars.
"Really weird change when they’ve been struggling to fit players names in the scoreboard," one fan asserted.
"It doesn't make any sense. It's not even a character limit thing because their names are the same number of characters!" another wrote.
"Being serious, between this and adjusting the abbreviations of players names day by day, it’s really odd Wimbledon don’t have a settled style guide," one more fan complained.
Amanda Anisimova defeats Aryna Sabalenka to reach maiden Slam final at Wimbledon
The semifinal clash between Aryna Sabalenka and Amanda Anisimova at Wimbledon on Thursday went the latter's way as she put together a commanding performance in the decider to eke out a 6-4, 4-6, 6-4 victory over the top seed. With her victory, the World No. 12 reached her maiden Major final and will next face a resurgent Iga Swiatek for silverware.
Anisimova will have to come up with a good game plan against the five-time Major winner, considering they haven't ever faced off on the WTA Tour. Swiatek, on her part, made it to the first singles final of her 2025 thus far in style, taking surprise semifinalist Belinda Bencic apart 6-2, 6-0 in one hour and 12 minutes in their last-eight encounter.
