After two hectic months getting healthy, Milos Raonic is ready for Wimbledon

WIMBLEDON – The signs of Milos Raonic’s racquet rust are evident as he goes through a rigorous practice with Italy’s Andreas Seppi.

You wouldn’t notice it if he were wearing his trademark sleeve, but he rarely wears it in practice.

The 24-year-old Canadian has kinesiology tape up his arm and around his shoulder, and down the back of the arm as well.

Given that right arm is his money-maker, that’s a lot of tape.

“Just soreness from going 10 weeks with almost playing nothing, my body catching up with my tennis. That’s it,” Raonic said Saturday, two days before he plays Spain’s Daniel Gimeno-Traver in the first round of singles at Wimbledon.

Six weeks ago, Raonic had a procedure to alleviate Morton’s Neuroma, a painful nerve condition in his right foot that cut short his clay-court season and forced him to miss the French Open.

He returned on the grass at Queen’s Club less than two weeks ago, winning a pair of three-setters before losing to Gilles Simon, 7-5 in the third set.

Now, as a defending Wimbledon semi-finalist, he must play best-of-five sets for the first time since Davis Cup in Vancouver in March.

Raonic’s draw is highly workable. He can have confidence against Gimeno-Traver, whom he defeated a year ago in the first round in Australia. Next up could be 37-year-old Tommy Haas, who has just returned from more than a year away from injury. After that comes a potentially tough test in Aussie Nick Kyrgios.

But Kyrgios, who came in a year ago as a major outsider and upset Rafael Nadal before losing to Raonic in the quarter-finals, and now is the No. 26 seed, has barely played.

His potential fourth-round opponents include No. 11 seed Grigor Dimitrov (who is struggling) and No. 21 Richard Gasquet (whom he defeated at Queen’s Club).

So the path is there, if Raonic can take it.

“I feel good. I know being the first match, especially grass, presenting its own challenges, I have to sort of really keep the concentration internal on myself, organize my game and make adjustments from there,” he said. “The most important thing for me is to find the rhythm and the right balance in being aggressive and trying to control the centre of the court.”

A tennis generation ago, a massive server like Raonic might have been a prohibitive favourite to win every time he walked into the All-England Club.

Times have changed, though. The playing surfaces are practically homogenized, with the clay courts playing quickly and the grass courts playing almost … slowly? And the big servers, including Raonic, rarely serve-and-volley as a general tactic.

So what else does he need?

“It takes someone who has a great ability to control the centre of the court because I think on grass, once you fall behind in the points, it takes something very special to get out of that. And once you’re able to control the centre of the court and really dictate and sort of control and make it on your terms, that’s a big thing,” he said.

“You see many guys do it in different ways. Roger (Federer) and Rafa do it mostly controlling with their forehand. Novak (Djokovic) likes to sort of make the guy move; he can change directions pretty much on demand, on both sides. I don’t think you can really afford to give up that centre of the court. You have to have clear command of that.”

How does Raonic do it?

“Serve and forehand, and hopefully return, and get that short forehand,” he said.