Wimbledon prompted quite a few raised eyebrows on Monday when three leaf-blowers suddenly appeared on Centre Court.
Yes, that’s the court with an £80 million roof meant to protect the grass from the rain – and it failed to protect the grass from the rain.
Instead, ball boys had to use leaf blowers to dry the grass (kind of like a hairdryer), seriously delaying play.
It wasn’t just any old match either – it was the first day of the whole grand slam, where defending champion, Serbia’s Novak Djokovic, was playing against Argentina’s Pedro Cachin.
They had only played one set 6-3 when light rain meant the players had to come off the pitch as it started to drizzle, while the roof lotted into place.
But, due to warm temperatures and the greenhouse effect of the court, the grass just did not dry off, prompting a 70-minute delay.
Djokovic even ended up performing a kind of slapstick to dry up parts of the lawn he considered particularly damp.
“It normally takes 10 to 20 minutes when the roof is closed for the air conditioning to do its job and grass to dry and to be ready for play,” the top player told the press after his match.
“We saw that players came back after maybe 15 minutes to Court One, and they resumed play. But we didn’t and we couldn’t really. Too many places on the court were too slippery and really moist. Touch the grass and your palm is completely wet.
“It was very strange that for more than an hour the situation was not changing at all for the better.
“We had fun with it. We received the good news that they will open the roof, then wind obviously did its job.”
Catherine Whitaker, co-host of The Tennis Podcast, told BBC Radio 4′s Today programme said the players were keen to get the first set played before the roof closed.
She said: “In the words of Tim Henman, ‘the grass was sweating’ under the roof.”
Whitaker continued: “I think the leaf-blowers were an emergency situation, I’m not sure they were in anyone’s plan. Perhaps they were somewhat a regrettable incident.”
She added that “no one quite knows” if something went wrong with the acclimatisation situation meant to dry the grass, but she was sure “extensive investigation took place overnight” as more rain is forecast on Tuesday.
Anyway, here’s a look at some of the reactions from people who were on the court at the time...