visitor from winnerland

So what was the actual as opposed to formal nationality of today’s winner of Wimbledon’s Men’s Singles? Forget where he came from: where does he live, from day to day, and how does it shape his occupation, affinity and outlook.

This year, Andy Murray has pretty much been living everywhere: starting in Australia, moving on the United States and then to Europe. Tournaments seem to be clustered to facilitate this migration. Wimbledon appears to be a side trip here on the European tour. He’s been living this kind of life since he left home at 15 to train for a professional tennis career in Barcelona. So also the year before. So also next year.

Like every other modern tennis player his nation is the court, the training camp, the hotel room and the airlines that link them. One thing that struck me about today’s classic Murray mumble is that he sounded more or less identical to the man he beat, Djokovic. They were speaking the national dialect of their nation, a kind of cautious, deliberately uninflected English designed to placate potentially volatile strangers who seem to self-generate all kinds of alarming expectations based on little knowledge of his personal or professional life. They’re helped in this by the genuinely British – ie not very good – ex tennis players who have to make a living commentating.

If you’re good enough to win Wimbledon you don’t come from anywhere but Winnerland; not these days. Your fellow citizens are all the other boss tennis players, along with golfers and F1 drivers of similar status and the supermodels who love them all.  All this guff about Saltires and ‘Scottish if he doesn’t win’ must look very strange from that eminence.

Comments

[nick s]

Citizens of a nation whose annual party is the luxury-brand junket of the Laureus Sports Awards. And to the travelling roadshow events (golf, tennis, F1, perhaps athletics) you can now probably add superannuated footballers who go off on short spells in Weird Foreign after their careers are over.

Wimbledon appears to be a side trip here on the European tour.

It was a lot more obvious at last year's Olympics, which was technically just another week-long ATP/WTA event interrupting the transition to the US, albeit one with no purse and nicer trinkets.

[ajay]

Interesting theory, but Murray disagrees. (Genuinely British meaning not very good is a remarkable case of the No True Scotsman fallacy being applied to an actual Scotsman.) If you're just trying to say that high level athletes lead a very weird life, well, twas ever thus. Ask the Athenians.

[jamie]

was actually thinking of an Englishman there, ie Andrew Castle.

[Igor Belanov]

I don't think the problem is that 'high level athletes lead a very weird life' as much as the fact that many people, and politicians and the media in particular, like to attach the flag to people who have a rather tenuous sporting link to the country. As Jamie points out, he effectively learnt his trade in Spain, and he trains and lives in Florida. No doubt Scottish tennis courts played a part somewhere along the line, but it might be nice just to congratulate the individual rather than trying to bask in their reflected glory.

[Alex]

Isn't this your piece about Lewis Hamilton from a couple of years back?

[nick s]

Same difference, though the tabs haven't devoted as much time to Murray's residence and domicile for HMRC purposes. Yet.

A mate of mine who's spent his entire working life in F1 (he now oversees a wind tunnel) told me that the travelling crew's drink of choice is Jack Daniel's, because it's available everywhere and you know what you're getting. Bought by the bottle, not the shot.

[Richard J]

Pretty much all tax treaties have a specific override that performer/sportsman fees for playing to be taxed in the country where they are performed.

There was the Agassi case a few years back where the tennis player was arguing that, say, paying in Wimbledon he was getting paid £10,000 for appearing, but £50,000 in payments for image rights, etc. (free-floating IP not attributable to playing) - he was told, in polite judicial language by the HoL, nice try.

(If, like me, you read the small print of Finance Acts, there was a specific law introduced for the Champions League final in Wembley a few years back stating income would not be taxed in the UK.)

[ajay]

many people, and politicians and the media in particular, like to attach the flag to people who have a rather tenuous sporting link to the country.

One of the people who likes to attach the saltire flag to Murray, despite his "tenuous links", is Murray himself, though. And it's just nuts to suggest that he "effectively learned his trade in Spain". He learned his trade in Scotland, with a Scottish coach, and won his first championship while he was living in Scotland. He moved to Barcelona specifically to attend a tennis academy and you don't do something like that if you aren't an excellent tennis player already.

[Igor Belanov]

I think quite a lot of less than excellent players attend tennis academies if they can afford to pay for them. Murray clearly has a lot of natural talent that was nurtured in Scotland, but surely it is telling that he felt he needed to move to Spain and then Florida in order to establish his superstardom.
Plus, I'm not denying that Murray feels Scottish or identifies with Scotland, or that people shouldn't back him because they were born within the same state. My problem, as with the Olympics, is that some people want to use individual success in a way that tries to enhance their own position or glorifies the country. It is sickening to watch the likes of Cameron and Salmond queueing up to get a piece of Murray's success.

[Phil]

It is sickening to watch the likes of Cameron and Salmond.

Fixed that for you.

[Igor Belanov]

Cheers Phil!

If I need any evidence:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/tennis/23225645

[dsquared]

but surely it is telling that he felt he needed to move to Spain and then Florida in order to establish his superstardom

Specifically, it's telling you that it's easier to train in a summer sport that can't be played in the rain in a place that is famous for its balmy and summery climate, rather than Scotland. I daresay that Swiss guy who won the Americas Cup did most of his yachting training somewhere other than Switzerland.

[Igor Belanov]

It tells me that Scotland and Switzerland would be foolish to try and take too much credit for the success of these particular sportspeople. With team sports there is usually more input from a 'host' country, though these days even that is debatable when top coaches are hired from abroad and almost all international players from some leading countries play almost their entire post 16 careers in foreign countries.

[dsquared]

Have you ever seen the film "Cool Runnings"?

[ajay]

Plus, I'm not denying that Murray feels Scottish or identifies with Scotland,

No, but the original post was: "If you’re good enough to win Wimbledon you don’t come from anywhere but Winnerland; not these days. Your fellow citizens are all the other boss tennis players, along with golfers and F1 drivers of similar status and the supermodels who love them all. All this guff about Saltires and ‘Scottish if he doesn’t win’ must look very strange from that eminence."

(Murray's girlfriend, by the way? Not a supermodel. A tennis player.)

[Doug]

The worst fall out from Murray's win and The Lions success is that it gives Mark Perryman the excuse to drone on again with his Marxism Today low rent Gramsci bollocks about the Left (re?)claiming patriotism. I wish he'd piss off to butler for Billy Bragg in his Dorset country pile and shut the fuck up.

[dsquared]

Ah, but what you miss is that Murray's victory in the tennis proves that Frank Furedi's philosophy is right about everything

[des von bladet]

"If you want a picture of the future, imagine Paula Radcliffe taking a dump in a metropolitan gutter — forever."