Inside the Wimbledon wormhole with Boris, Martina … and Arron Banks? | Marina Hyde


The verbal rallies have started at SW19 as Martina Navratilova came out on top in a joust with the Brexit financier while Boris Becker was left stumped by Sue Barker’s opening gambit

“To everyone’s surprise,” reflects a character at the start of sci-fi satire District 9, “the [alien] ship didn’t come to a stop over Manhattan or Washington or Chicago, but instead coasted to a halt directly over the city of Johannesburg.”

Some may have experienced similar feelings of bathos this week, as the tear in the news-sport continuum finally blew wide open – not in Moscow, where you might have expected it, but in SW19. The transdimensional gate was opened by Sue Barker, who kicked off this year’s BBC Wimbledon coverage with the deathless inquiry: “So, Boris, what is your association with the Central African Republic?”

Related: Speak for England, Danny Dyer. You’ve blown the lid on Brexit | Marina Hyde

Both Wimbledon vignettes are as unsurprising as Arron Banks being bested by someone for whom English is a third language

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