I was possibly the most significant failure on center court in this tournament. Nick Kyrgios had completed his anarchic and rage-filled third-round win against Stefanos Tsitsipas and was about to address the crowd. Only one person could stand up to him in this state of mind. A woman with the moral strength and laser empathy to cut through his layers of bravado and communicate directly.
Unfortunately, one of Barker's many powers, she could only pass along comments on Kyrgios' performance from afar: "the swearing, Tracy" – then let us know that Casualty will be following us in a few minutes. Given what we had just witnessed, it sounded like a coded message.
When Barker retires on Sunday, he leaves behind some big sneakers to fill. BBC producers know this; she was noticeable by how she held her back on the first day, giving her chosen replacement, Isa Guha, the first bite of the strawberry to avoid comparison. We didn't see Barker on our screens until the afternoon, when he produced one of his effortless summaries of the play on the wickets, stopping to comment on a live match point and then seamlessly transitioning between the Emma Raducanu and Andy Murray games.
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