She couldn’t win a single game.
In the third round of the French Open on Saturday, Wang Xinyu of China had to believe there was at least a chance she could defeat Iga Swiatek, the event’s reigning women’s singles champion and top seed. Wang is no slouch, after all. She is a hard-hitting 21-year-old who in April hit a career-high ranking of 59th in the world, and she can put up a viable fight against the very best.
But she lost, and it was as ugly as can be: 6-0, 6-0 — in tennis parlance, a dreaded double bagel. The match didn’t last much longer than the warm-up.
I say there’s glory in that kind of imperfection.
Long live the frail. The weary and worn, the strugglers and the stragglers. The athletes who woefully suffer losses in public.
Long live the defeated in sports.
We’ve seen many of them over the past week or so, and we’ll soon be seeing more.
Of course, this won’t happen only on the slippery clay at the French Open.
The N.B.A. and N.H.L. playoffs have finally reached their finals. College softball, growing fast in popularity, is in the mix with the N.C.A.A. Division I championships. The Oklahoma Sooners are aiming for a third straight title — and to add to their Division I record of 51 consecutive victories — after beating Stanford on Monday in a semifinal…
