I couldn’t help but notice that two of the big Wimbledon seeds who fell in the second round this week were both splashed across various media in the run-up to this year’s championship.
Novak Djokovic had high hopes for Wimbledon, keen on improving his ranking of No.3 in the world, and after defeating Roger Federer at the Australian Open at the beginning of the year the No.3 seed felt he had a decent shot of getting past the five-times Wimbledon champion at this Grand Slam.

It wasn’t to be, of course, as he crashed out in a straight-sets defeat to unpredictable Russian Marat Safin, a two-time Grand Slam winner and former world No.1 at the age of 20.

I don’t think Djokovic would have taken Safin for granted, because on his day – and particularly on grass – the Russian has the ability to beat anyone - even if he does hate grass - but I do feel that the Serb’s preparations might have been to blame.

Djokovic came straight from a semi-final defeat at the French Open at Roland Garros to London to play at Queen’s Club, losing in the final to Rafael Nadal (incidentally Nadal’s first ever grass court tournament win).

Yet while Nadal saw sense to take a break for a week before returning for Wimbledon, Djokovic stayed in London and was subsequently all over television talking about his chances, Nadal’s chances, Federer’s chances, and just about everybody else’s chances of doing well at Wimbledon as well as fielding questions on whether he could ever break into the top two while Federer is still around.

He also took part in a few promotional events, was seen playing doubles with London Mayor Boris Johnson - again something that was splashed all over television and the tabloids - and spent even more time talking about what was going to happen at Wimbledon.

Perhaps, he should have gone home and relaxed, or stayed away from the cameras and enjoyed a week off. There was no sign of Nadal on my television, as he was back in Mallorca, while Federer also kept a low profile following his tournament win in Halle the week before.

And in the women’s game, former world No.1 Maria Sharapova was destroyed by Russian compatriot Alla Kudryavtseva, who has yet to win a tournament on the WTA tour.

So, that’s both No.3 seeds out in the second round, but Sharapova’s defeat comes as more of a surprise than Djokovic’s defeat by Safin. Kudryavtseva was ranked 154th going in to Wimbledon. Safin might be 75th in the men’s race, but he’s been there, done it, and got the T-shirt.

Like Djokovic, there has been a lot of attention surrounding Sharapova before and during Wimbledon, with the usual throng of photographers keen to get any shot they can of her to sell to the red-top newspapers and celebrity-trash magazines, while she has also taken time out to promote her mobile phone accessories designs and clothing range.

I’m all for creativity and entrepreneurial skills, promoting yourself and charitable organisations, but there’s a time and a place for that. When your main focus is winning Wimbledon and trying to regain your position as No.1 in the world, then all other time-consuming endeavours that take your mind away from your main goal.

The trend these days is for players to be involved in so many sponsor-related media events to promote something (because that’s where the million pound contracts and freebies are) and for a player in the top 20 in the world that’s a lot easier to achieve than going out and playing up to seven rounds at a major tournament, and it’s a sad state of affairs, but tennis isn’t the only sport being affected in this way.