You Cannot Be Serious!
Bad temper on Centre Court
by Claire Law
Suitable for Whole School (Sec)
Aims
To reflect upon Wimbledon’s history and consider how anger can be used to promote justice.
Preparation and materials
- You will need the PowerPoint slides that accompany this assembly (You Cannot Be Serious!) and the means to display them.
- Have available the YouTube video ‘John McEnroe’s epic Wimbledon meltdown: “You cannot be serious!”’ and the means to show it during the assembly. It is 6.16 minutes long and is available at: https://youtu.be/ransFQVzf6c
Assembly
- Show Slide 1.
Welcome the students to the assembly. - Show Slide 2.
Ask the students, ‘Who’d like to play a game?’
Explain that the task is to guess the location of the image that’s hidden behind this brick wall. When the students pick a number, the brick will disappear to reveal part of the picture.
Click the numbers on the screen as the students select them, slowly revealing the image.
Encourage the students to guess the location after each brick disappears. Eventually, you can reveal the correct answer: Centre Court at Wimbledon, in London. - Show Slide 3.
Wimbledon is where the Wimbledon Championships are held every July. It is the oldest tennis tournament in the world, and many regard it as the most prestigious. - There have been many memorable Wimbledon moments over the years. Let’s look at some of the big names to win Wimbledon over the last 25 years.
- Show Slide 4.
Here, we see Venus Williams holding the Wimbledon trophy after beating Lindsay Davenport during the Wimbledon women’s singles final in 2000. This was the first time that she won Wimbledon. She went on to lift the trophy a further five times. - Show Slide 5.
Here, we see Serbian player, Novak Djokovic, holding the men’s singles trophy at the 2019 Wimbledon Championships. He has won Wimbledon a total of seven times, most recently in 2022. In 2023, he was defeated in the final by Carlos Alcaraz. - Show Slide 6.
I wonder if you recognize this tennis player. This is British player, Andy Murray, and he has won Wimbledon twice, in 2013 and 2016. - Further back in time, there was an iconic moment at Wimbledon. You won’t remember it because it happened before you were born.
Show Slide 7.
The year was 1981, and it was the first round of the men’s singles at Wimbledon. John McEnroe was the No. 2 seed at the time, and he was playing a fellow American who was ranked at No. 40, Tom Gullikson. After the umpire ruled a ball out, McEnroe had an on-court meltdown, shouting at the umpire.
Let’s watch some footage of McEnroe’s meltdown.
Show the first 30 seconds to 1 minute of the YouTube video ‘John McEnroe’s epic Wimbledon meltdown: “You cannot be serious!”’. - We just heard McEnroe shouting the phrase that is now associated with him: ‘You cannot be serious!’
In the next game of the match, McEnroe lost his temper again and insulted the umpire, which led to him being awarded a penalty point. McEnroe then questioned the umpire’s competence and demanded that the referee be called. The referee backed the umpire, and the match resumed. McEnroe went on to win the match in straight sets, and won his subsequent matches too, ending up as the winner of the 1981 Wimbledon men’s singles. - Nowadays, we have the benefits of digital tools to make umpiring easier. Hawk-Eye, a computer vision system that triangulates images from several cameras to map the trajectory and landing point of a ball, was introduced at Wimbledon in 2007, and is used as an impartial second opinion.
Fast-forward to 2021, and the Australian Open was the first grand-slam event to introduce electronic line calling, replacing line judges. Many other tennis tournaments have followed suit, although officials at Wimbledon and the French Open are still reluctant to remove human judgement.
In McEnroe’s day, these digital tools weren’t available, and judgements were down to the human eye, prompting his angry outbursts.
Time for reflection
Let’s take a moment to reflect on how we react when we don’t agree with something or think that it’s unfair. Perhaps, like McEnroe, we’re hot-headed and find ourselves quick to shout angrily in protest. Or perhaps we can respond, rather than react, and calmly state why we disagree, without losing our cool.
Anger is not an unhealthy emotion. We know that Jesus was angry at injustice. He used his anger to make a case that people should not be excluded from God’s love. He led by example, spending time with people who were regarded as outcasts at the time.
Many role models from history have used their anger about injustice to campaign for change.
Show Slide 8.
Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks and Greta Thunberg were not simply mouthing off. Rather, they took a considered approach to their angry feelings, choosing what they wanted to say and how they said it. These three people were all serious about injustice, and used their anger to respond in a way that helped to raise awareness and effect change.
So, let’s take a moment to reflect on what makes us angry.
Pause to allow time for thought.
How do we tend to respond when we feel that way?
Pause to allow time for thought.
What are we serious about changing in our life and in our world?
Pause to allow time for thought.
When we’re angry, how can we respond by keeping our cool, rather than reacting with hot-headedness?
Pause to allow time for thought.
How can we express our anger healthily, rather than destructively?
Pause to allow time for thought.
Prayer
Dear Lord,
This month, we will have the chance to watch the Wimbledon tennis championships.
We’ll see the efforts of top-flight sportspeople and might even be inspired to play a game of tennis ourselves.
Today, we’ve focused on how one player behaved on the court.
We’ve used this example to reflect on how we feel, think and act when we see things that feel unfair.
Help us to be people who can respond, rather than react, to injustice.
Help us to use our anger to make a positive change in our world, rather than causing hurt and suffering.
Help us to be serious about choosing how to respond to our emotions, rather than being ruled by them.
Amen.
