TV VIEW:APART FROM relegating a couple of Serena and Venus Williams matches to the backyard (well, Court Two), the Wimbledon organisers had done a fairly flawless job the last fortnight, until mucking it all up yesterday .

Having the men’s final clash with Kerry v Cork in Killarney was, you have to say, a schoolboy error.

And so, it was another one of those telly days, a cross-court backhand from Kieran Donaghy, brilliantly intercepted by Novak Djokovic, played in to the path of Declan O’Sullivan whose drop-shot was expertly buried by Rafa Nadal, the Austin Stacks sharp-shooter rifling the ball in to the roof of the net. And with that the batteries on the remote wore out.

Saturday, mercifully, was less complicated. Petra Kvitova v Maria Sharapova really only clashed with Sky News’ gentle all-day promotion of the Vladimir Klitschko v David Haye punch-fest.

Lennox Lewis, in fairness to him, didn’t want to get too immersed in the hype, and so when he assessed where Haye stood in the pantheon of pugilistic greats, he refused to get too carried away. “He’s the Muhammad Ali of his era,” he said, so at least he had a sense of perspective about it all.

Several hours later Sky’s breaking news banner broke the bad news that the Muhammad Ali of his era had lost on points to Vlad the Impaler. It was, though, only when they showed us that photo of Haye’s broken littlest piggy that we realised why he could only sting like a butterfly on the night that was in it.

Sky wondered, therefore, if there’d be a rematch. As John McEnroe put it yesterday, when Sue Barker asked if he was happy to be at Wimbledon for men’s final’s day, “is the Pope a Catholic?”

No more than the flowery things in your garden this weather, McEnroe and Lindsay Davenport were covered in green flies when they reported for centre court duty on Saturday. Barker explained that the place had been invaded by the pesky things.

They didn’t bother Kvitova much, it has to be said. The Czech (who was, somewhat alarmingly, -12 when compatriot Martina Navratilova won her first Wimbledon title) swatted away Sharapova’s challenge.

“Sharapova was on the receiving end of a steam engine,” said Virginia Wade after the match, which pretty much was the gist of a final that we’re unlikely to be reminiscing about in years to come.

Navratilova, watching from the stands, was probably pining for a little more finesse too, and a little less six-feet-plus-fuelled war-of-attrition baseline-bashing power.

The men’s final never quite lit up either. At one point, Boris Becker, in the BBC commentary box, was reduced to counting how many times Djokovic bounced the ball before serving.

“I counted 17 times,” he said, “I was just doing it for the fun of it.”

“Ah, stop,” said Andrew Castle, before counting “14, 15, 16, 17 . . .” before the next serve. “Wow,” he conceded.

Soon after Djokovic did one of those mad stretchy things to reach an unreachable ball, and Boris, very kindly, warned us not to “try that at home”.

But those of us who were inspired by such athleticism to try the stretchy thing to reach the remote that had bounced across the living-room floor would like to thank the fire brigade for their assistance. Lads, your reward will be great.

A harrowing day, then, for those who worship at the altar of Rafa, including his best buddy Rory McIlroy, who was watching from the stands.

Earlier he’d spoken to the BBC and was told that Jack Nicklaus had half-suggested he was chilling out a bit too much after the US Open and needed to get his focus back on golf.

It’s a fair old indication of McIlroy’s spooky maturity that he didn’t tell Jack to mind his own, instead reassuring him that he knew what he was doing.

It was McIlroy’s second trip to Wimbledon last week, he’d dropped in on Tuesday and ended up having a chat with McEnroe.

“Do you play golf,” McIroy asked.

“Very badly,” McEnroe admitted. “A couple of times a year. You can imagine, I get frustrated on a tennis court, on a golf course? I’ve been known to run out of clubs before the round is over.”

Seriously, you’d pay a hefty admission fee to watch McEnroe play golf.

The course would be sprinkled with splintered clubs, snapped over the maestro’s knee, and the bunkers would echo to the sound of: “You cannot be serious!”

“Do you play tennis,” asked McEnroe.

“A little, but my backhand . . .” McIlroy’s voice trailed off, like he just didn’t really want to talk about it.

Mere mortals, then, when they leave their sporting comfort zones. They float likes bees, and sting like butterflies.

“ Lennox Lewis, in fairness to him, didn’t want get too immersed in the hype, and so when he assessed where Haye stood in the pantheon of pugilistic greats, he refused to get too carried away.

‘He’s the Muhammad Ali of his era,’ he said, so at least he had a sense of perspective about it all