59-year-old Annabel Croft Is Enjoying Her Boldest Wimbledon Yet: ‘I’m Having More Fun With Fashion Than Ever’

If there’s one thing Annabel Croft has plenty of, it’s energy. The Wimbledon presenter and pundit has worked 15-hour long days when we speak at the beginning of the famous south west London Championships, but she’s as lively and upbeat as if it were 7am. ‘My kids always say they can’t keep up with my energy, I just motor on through,’ says the 59-year-old who has been presenting at Wimbledon for over two decades. ‘It’s just fun. It’s got great atmosphere, huge crowds and there’ve already been some exciting matches, a couple of upsets…’

Croft was in the commentating box for Serena Williams’ return to Wimbledon after four years off the court. ‘I thought her level was absolutely jaw-dropping. I felt like she would have beaten three quarters of the draw with the level she played, but she was against a young, up-and-coming star who matched it and raised the bar,’ says Croft talking about the 20-year-old Australian player Maya Joint, who knocked Williams out of the Championships.

‘It was an incredible night witnessing [Serena’s] comeback, getting the standing ovation, and just the electricity around the whole arena,’ says Croft. ‘But I know she wasn’t happy, because the handshake was pretty swift.’

Croft, who played tennis professionally and became a British Number One when she was just a teenager, says that during the two-week grass court tournament she ‘lives, breathes, eats and sleeps’ tennis. At the end of each day, she’ll prepare again for the next, swotting up on the players and catching up on games she might have missed. But alongside the tennis preparation, she also spends a lot of time thinking about what she’ll be wearing.

Dave Benett

‘I love fashion and being able to use Wimbledon as a place to enjoy the fashion as well,’ says Croft, who regularly gets ready with her youngest daughter, Lily. ‘She’ll come into my dressing area and start picking out things and going, “I think you should wear this, don’t wear that, no, that looks awful”,’ says Croft, welcoming her daughter’s honesty.

‘Even the other day Lily said to me, “Mum, you can’t wear that shape of jeans anymore.”’ When her skinny white jeans went missing, her daughter was thrilled: ‘She never wanted to see them again,’ she laughs, who over the years has become attuned to what does and doesn’t look good on camera.

She’s also grown more confident in her fashion choices with age and recently did a huge clear out of her wardrobe, taking pieces to her local charity shops (keep watch Kingston-upon-Thames residents!). ‘I think if I feel good in an outfit, it makes it gives me extra confidence, and I never want to feel like an outfit is wearing me,’ says Croft. ‘Whereas before I would probably have been much shyer about wearing certain things, my two daughters have pushed me in a direction with fashion that I’ve got more comfortable with being bolder.’

‘I love to use Wimbledon as a place to enjoy fashion’

She recently inspired her daughter-in-law to buy the same drop-waisted dress as her from Australian brand Posse: ‘It’s wonderful when you can mix generations, and 30-somethings can wear the same as me in my late 50s.’

As for the fashion of the players on court, she praises Naomi Osaka for being ‘unbelievably brave’ when she walked out for her first game in a stunning custom-made kimono by Tokyo-based designer Yaga Hani. ‘I love the fact that tennis players push the boundaries,’ says Croft, recalling the period when she was coming up as a player when tennis felt less in favour with fashion. ‘There was a bit more functionality about the way they dressed the players, and there was just less creativity and less femininity.’

Larry Ellis

Croft on court in 1984

Croft says the Williams sisters were to thank for reigniting the opportunity to have fun with fashion on court. ‘They took it to a whole different level, and they were the really the first two who made it like a piece of theatre when they walked out onto court,’ she says.

‘I never want to feel like an outfit is wearing me’

Naomi Osaka, she says, has followed in their footsteps. ‘I think she’s enjoyed really pushing it but she’s unbelievably brave. When I was younger, I would have been more scared walking out onto court like that.’

What does Croft think about the critics who claim the outfits distract from the tennis? ‘If anything, it’s kind of an intimidation factor,’ says Croft. ‘I think it’s quite clever from a sporting point of view, because she really is making a statement, and the opponent’s got to cope with all of that going on and not get distracted. But I think actually anything that gets eyeballs onto tennis and makes people watch it is positive.’

Shi Tang//Getty Images

When she’s not in the commentating box or in front of the camera, Croft will happily stop people at Wimbledon and ask them where they’ve got their outfits from. ‘I’m always spotting fashion. There was a couple of women I stopped the other day, I just thought they had the most beautiful dresses on, and just looked so stunning for Wimbledon.’

For the Wimbledon finals, when Croft will interview the players on the court, we can expect some Brunello Cucinelli looks. But in the meantime, she has more long days ahead, hours more tennis preparation and analysis, and even the odd anxiety dream.

‘I’ll have dreams about being back out there on court where I’m trying to hit the ball and there’s reeds and rushes, and it’s like a jungle that I’m playing through, and I can’t get the ball through the jungle.’ Luckily, Croft will spend the next week focussing on matches between the World’s best tennis players, while wearing looks she loves. And there won’t be a jungle in sight, just immaculately kept Wimbledon lawns.

ELLE Collective is a community of fashion, beauty and culture lovers. For access to exclusive content, events, inspiring advice from our Editors and industry experts, as well as the opportunity to meet designers, thought-leaders and stylists, become a member today HERE.

Hannah Nathanson is Features Director at ELLE. She commissions, edits and writes stories for online and print, spanning everything from ’Generation Flake’ to cover profiles with Dua Lipa and Hailey Bieber. One of her most surreal moments as a journalist has been ‘chairing’ a conversation between Jodie Comer and Phoebe Waller-Bridge from her living room. The word she says most in the office is ‘podcast’.