1 Wimbledon's Croquet Roots

Wimbledon might be famous for tennis, but the first tournament held at the venue was actually put together to raise funds to pay for croquet equipment. The All-England Club initially featured only croquet, and lawn tennis was not added until 1875, several years after the organisation was set up.

2 Rufus the Hawk - Pigeon Deterrer

Image Credit: Phrine (Image Cropped)

London has a massive pigeon problem, but it is extremely rare to see one of the birds at Wimbledon. That is due to the presence of Rufus the Harris Hawk, who acts as a deterrent to pigeons. Rufus even has his own Twitter account with almost 7,000 followers.

3 White Balls

New balls, please! Did you know that the tennis balls used at Wimbledon used to be white? In fact, white balls were used at the tournament up until 1986, when yellow balls were introduced to make them easier to see, especially for television viewers watching at home.

4 Henman's Disqualification

Image Credit: Dave Lowensohn

Former British number one Tim Henman was often described as being too nice to succeed but in 1995 he was disqualified from the tournament for accidentally hitting a ball girl with a loose shot. Henman was playing a doubles match with Jeremy Bates and was mortified by his error and to this day he remains the only player to have ever been disqualified from Wimbledon.

5 Clothing Approval

Wimbledon is famous for its strict dress code, but did you know outfits have to be approved in advance? However, as long as the clothes are white, they are likely to be given the green light.

6 Towels

Wimbledon is big business and huge amounts of tennis merchandise are sold every year. But the biggest selling item is perhaps a surprising one - it's towels. Thousands of towels are sold every year - it seems British tennis fans cannot get enough of them.

7 Centre Court Bombed

During World War II, Wimbledon's famous Centre Court was bombed by the Nazis and it took nine years for the grounds to be fully repaired.

8 Food and Drink

Image Credit: Shari's Berries Flickr page | Shari's Berries website

Food and drink is a huge part of the Wimbledon experience, with some 200,000 glasses of Pimm's consumed over the tournament fortnight, as well as around 30,000 kg of strawberries and about 30,000 cups of tea and coffee.

9 The Renshaws

Venus and Serena Williams might be the most famous siblings in tennis, but they were not the first to meet in a Wimbledon final. Doubles duo Ernest and William Renshaw dominated the sport in the early years and William beat his brother in the singles final on three occasions.

10 The Rest Day

Wimbledon's rest day is hugely controversial and it is the only one of the four Grand Slam events to persist with taking the middle Sunday off. When bad weather strikes, it can cause big delays to the event, but the tournament is sticking to tradition with no play on the middle Sunday.