A summer of tennis on telly turns me into a super-binger

How do they do it without dying of boredom? What’s that saying about having too much of a good thing?

‘These people should get a life,’ I’ve been known to say.

But, this week, I realised that I’ve been living a lie.

“You’re a real binge watcher, then,” my neighbour said, as we chewed the cud on the topic of the week: Wimbledon.

When formulating my opinions on binge watching I hadn’t factored in tennis at all.

My neighbour was telling me how, when she was young, her mum “abandoned” her and her brother for two weeks every year.

“She just left us to it. She didn’t cook our meals or clean the house. She would tell us: ‘don’t bother me, I’m watching the tennis’. She would pull up her armchair and sit in front of the TV for the whole Wimbledon fortnight.’”

That’s me. From the start of the tournament to the finish, I am fixated on that little rectangle in the corner of our living room. I have been known to watch tennis all day long, from morning to late in the evening. A clear case of binge watching.

I have been an avid watcher of Wimbledon since childhood. Often, I spend all day watching matches and then, late in the evening, I’d watch them all over again on Today at Wimbledon.

Not only have I been binge watching Wimbledon all week, I’ve been tuning in to tennis almost every day for the past month.

Throughout June I’ve watched many of the world’s top tennis players battle it out in England’s other top tournaments leading up to Wimbledon: Nottingham Open, Queen’s Club Championship, Birmingham Classic, Eastbourne International.

I watched Brits Katie Boulter, Emma Raducanu and Harriet Dart fight it out with their opponents. I was in front of the telly when British number one Boulter triumphed in Nottingham, retired through illness in Birmingham and got beaten in Eastbourne.

I witnessed Harriet Dart, the British number two, furiously bet an umpire £50,000 that a ball called in at the Nottingham Open was out - for the record I agreed with her, but not with the way she dealt with it; I watched players slip and slide on wet courts in rain-lashed Nottingham and attempt to serve in fierce coastal winds in Eastbourne.

I saw Britain’s Billy Harris - who I hadn’t heard of before and who carved out his career travelling to tournaments around Europe in a Transit van - reach the semi-final at Eastbourne. Sadly he was knocked out in the first round at Wimbledon.

And the brilliant Paul Jubb from Hull, who lost his first round match after a tight, five set battle.

Billy Harris playing in the first round at Wimbledon. Picture: Zac Goodwin (Image: Zac Goodwin/PA)

Paul Jubb lost a tight five set match. Picture: John Walton/PA (Image: PA)

So, in truth, far from being a non-binger, I’m a super-binger. And it’s all down to tennis.

Day after day, at this time of year, my home is filled with the thwack-thwack of small woolly balls being driven across nets, of line calls, of challenges, of aces, volleys, passing shots and drop shots, of cheers and chants from the crowd, of endless statistics over who won the most second serves and who made the most unforced errors.

Although I will be at home all day, for the next two weeks very little will get done. My house will not get tidied, the laundry basket will not be emptied, the cupboards will be bare.

My husband, who hates all sport, knows to keep his distance.

We’ve had wall-to-wall football, which attracts extreme bingeing, and pretty soon we’ll have nothing but athletics, live from the Paris Olympics, which will also have people glued to the telly.

But now it’s my time to hog the TV. It’s my favourite two weeks of the year. Time for a good old, serious binge.