Olympiad XXX: Tsonga Outlasts Raonic 6-3 3-6 25-23!

Calls for a tie-break or some other means of ending a deciding set apart from a service break at the All-England Lawn Tennis club should receive a fever pitch after today's 2nd round clash between Jo-Wilfried Tsonga of France and Milos Raonic of Canada became the longest Olympic tennis match in history.

Tsonga outlasted Raonic 6-3 3-6 25-23 in a match took just under 4 hours, and ended on a dramatic match point in which the Frenchman ended on the ground. The first two sets took just under 1 hour, with the third set lasting for exactly 180 minutes (3 hours).

The issue of marathon early round matches at Wimbledon has become a prominent one following the ridiculous spectacle of John  Isner and Nicolas Mahut playing for nearly 11 hours over 3 days at Wimbledon in 2010, inthe longest tennis match of all time. Just this year on Day 6 of the tournament, Sam Querrey and Marin Cilic played the third longest match in Wimbledon history as well, with Cilic coming out victorious 17-15 in the deciding 5th set in 5 hours, 31 minutes. Each of the previous "winners" of these marathon matches (Isner, Cilic) have gone on to promptly lose their next  match.

It should also  be noted that each of these recent marathon matches has tended to feature large (well over 6'4") men with gigantic, powerful serves, which make service breaks unlikely to occur. If a tie-breaker of some kind was implemented after either 12 or 24 games were played in the deciding set, I think this would be reasonable. The status quo is simply indefensible. It is more likely that marathon matches will continue to occur as the players get larger and possess more powerful serves. Something must be done sooner rather than later.

Tsonga will face the winner of the match between Feliciano Lopez of Spain and Juan Monaco of Argentina in the 3rd round.