Undie Man!

I'm not a follower of tennis but last night my partner and I watched the most amazing match. The final of the Australian Open between Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal was a feast of unbelievable shots and incomprehensible returns. But far more learned commentators will certainly be commenting on that, so I won’t.

What I wish to comment on is Rafa’s shorts. Or his undies, I’m not sure which. In an earlier game (the first time I had watched Nadal play) we noticed Rafa’s habit of extricating his shorts from his butt-crack. Thinking he must be wearing new, overly tight shorts we checked his next game to see if he had changed them, perhaps turning up in the regulation baggies. But no, he appeared in the same outfit – with the same habit. Seems it is his regular uniform.

So, when we settled in to watch what proved to be an epic finals match, peppered with feats of wizardry and physical skill seldom matched outside the World Wrestling Federation, we couldn’t help but be intrigued by Rafael’s pre-serve ritual. Because there most certainly was a pattern. It went something like this:

1. receive tennis balls
2. select ball to play
3. put other ball in pocket
4. pick undies out of butt crack
5. pull pocket straight
6. bounce ball several times
7. serve

It gave the game a nice rhythm as my partner and I chanted: check balls, drop one, undies undies, pull pocket, bounce bounce, smash (run around very fast etc).

A quick trawl of the internet reveals that this is a well-known habit, and apparently Rafa has said by way of explanation for his behaviour that his butt is big (?!). Which to my mind is rubbish. My butt is big. His looks like two mangoes snuggled into a silk hanky.

So I am a little surprised by the world of tennis. I’m not sure I would go on telly and fiddle around with my undies in front of millions of people. But then he is a tennis magician, currently the best in the world, so I’ll overlook it. At least he doesn’t jiggle his frontal bits.