So, my friend did most of the research into tickets and Wimbledon basically gives out tickets in three ways. First, there is a small set available outright for purchase. They're super expensive and snapped up quickly. None of those are for general "grounds passes" which are the lifeblood of the tournaments early days. The second way is a national lottery drawing where each UK-based applicant gets a shot at two tickets for any random day (I may be getting some of the details wrong there, but needless to say we were not eligible here). The last way is to go to Wimbledon and stand in a queue.
Now, if this was say the US Open, the third option doesn't exist, becuase the first option is for all tickets for every day. You can order tickets months in advance as easily as you can day of (granted, day of may require teh secondary market). You can get a groudns pass day of by just showing up and maybe needing to wait in line.
But this isn't the US Open - this is Wimbledon, a tournament so in love with its own traditions it is slowly losing itself. Nothing speaks more loudly to this than the queue. Apparently, a creation of a long-before-time when people didn't have computers that could let anyone buy a ticket. Wimbledon allowed basically the everyman to watch matches. Well, this is 2023 and this queue system is insane. Basically you show up and wait hours to get a queue card to wait longer to get access to buy tickets for the day. The one positive I guess is the price is flat, so it is "cheap", but time is money, so that cheap-ness is hollow as hell.
I should mention, apparently the queue on the 3rd was notably bad, both from a higher number of people coming than expected (based on prior years) and some unannounced amped up security measures which made it basically unmanageable (Wimbledon themselves have admitted this), but I'm not talking about yesterday, I'm talking about the system in general. If it works as expected based on prior years, if you show up around 8am, you would be the ~5000th person or so to show up, have a good chance of getting into the grounds around noon (play starts at 11am) and off you go.
But really, in 2023 do we need people to wait four hours? That's also the "standard". On the day we arrived, people showed up at 3am and got in around 1pm. How exactly is this format, something that encourages to people eitehr to camp out overnight, or show up at 8am for chance to get to watch tennis, something for the "common man." It isn't when the common man would need to take off of work to attempt to go to Wimbledon, with a non-zero chance they will end up shit out of luck.
The wrost part is Wimbledon lean's into this ridiculous process despite two underlying ridiculous facts: (1) again, in 2023 having to queue to buy tickets that for basically any other comparable event would be available simply online, and (2) they can't organize the queue anyway.
On #2, we arrived around 8:30 and were led into the giant field taht is Wimbledon Park (a ways away from the actual Tennis groudns), and then led into a line numbered K8. K9 was to the left, K7 to the right. These numbers seemed to mean nothing, or at least had no discernable meaning. Lanes K12-K7 faced one way, and slowly people from those queues wouild be led and turned to face the opposite direction into K6-K1. None of this is explained - despite them handing out a 34-page manual entitled "Guide to Queueing" that is given to everyone. Literally wasting hundreds of thousands of pages of paper, of trees, to explain a system and the pages don't even explain it well.
As for #1, Wimbledon is just way to stuck up its own ass at this point. I get it in terms of the legacy of the tournament, the oldest major, the home of tennis, all that stuff. And that is so deeply imprinted taht even today basically any young player will still say their lifelong dream as a player is to win specifically Wimbledon.
But this whole love of the Queue System is just a continuation of all the ridiculous shit Wimbledon has latched onto. The worst being the all-white that has led to some awful optics with Wimbledon not wavering on things like the soles of Nick Kyrgios's shoes, to the under-shorts worn by women's players who had specifically raised issue with the idea of having to wear all white when statistically 25% of the players would be on their period. As with many of their traditions, Wimbledon finally relented on at least the undergarments point.
But beyond that, from the "no play on Middle Sunday" (since gone away with) year after year over-stuffing Monday leading to cascading scheduling issues. The whole calling the draws "Ladies" and "Gentlemens". All of it just wreaks of classicism and elitsm that has myriad issues, from how deeply embedded these ideals are with Tennis sadly (specifically Wimbledon at fault here...), to a continuation of a general unearned British Exceptionalism that slips into every part of life in England today (more on that in a separate piec).
What annoys me the most of the whole situation is Wimbledon is so stuck on the Queue being part of the tradition. Among the thousands of us waiting, were families playing catch, and people picnicking, and I'm sure Wimbledon will market the shit out of this fact, but holy hell is it not easier to just, I don't know, buy tickets online and not need to waste your day doing this stuff?
At the end of the day, Wimbledon will carry on with The Queue because it has basically gotten this reputation as the most important, most "pure", most perfect major and despite no real reason for this in the year of our Lord 2023, it will always have this moniker. I can hope the magnified nature of The Queue due to teh security issues and what not, will maybe make them reconsider The Queue. But knowing this tournament is - it won't. That will persist. Their obstinance to developing will persist, and they'll go on thinking they're the world's greatest infallible sporting institution, just like their country thinks about their place in the world. But for me, I'll never go to the All England Club until the get rid of The Queue.
