NEW YORK—Imagine if fans at a Major League Baseball game were told they needed to wait until the end of an inning to go grab a beer and a hot dog. Or if folks at an NFL or NBA game weren’t supposed to head to the restroom until after a quarter finished. Would never happen, right?
That, though, is essentially what etiquette long has demanded at tennis matches, particularly at Grand Slam tournaments such as the U.S. Open, which started Monday. No one gets in or out during a game. Indeed, not even between games, sometimes. At the start of a set, for example, everyone has been required to hang on until the first changeover, which arrives after three games.
