Queen Camilla surprises Arthur Fery at Wimbledon live on BBC as Clare Balding left shocked

Queen Camilla made a surprise visit to the All England Club on Wednesday and she made sure she spoke to Arthur Fery before his match against Flavio Cobolli

Arthur Fery received a surprise from Queen Camilla just minutes before his Wimbledon quarter-final against Flavio Cobolli. Both players were preparing for their final eight clash when Queen Camilla suddenly sneaked up behind Fery as she headed for the Royal Box.

After shaking Fery’s hand and having a small chat with him, she then went over and did the same with Cobolli. But as the BBC broadcast the pictures live, presenter Clare Balding could not quite believe what she was seeing.

She said: “It’s the Queen, right behind them. I love this! And she’s going to go and say hello to Arthur before he steps out on court!

“That is, as Tim (Henman) says, Arthur Fery has been able to manage everything so far as if he’s been doing it his whole life. He’s a very, very cool customer.”

Queen Camilla made a surprise visit to the All England Club on Wednesday with her sister Annabel Elliott. She met a line up of Wimbledon staff, players, and local workers, including Heather Watson, the former British number one.

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When asked what they discussed by the Press Association, Watson revealed: “She’s super down-to-earth. I started sweating profusely with nerves. She asked me about Wimbledon and my career.”

She then added: “She was lovely. I met the previous Queen, I think it was over 10 years ago now, in exactly the same sort of place with Laura (Robson).”

The Queen also spoke with Richard Gammage, who is chief executive of City Harvest, a charity combating food waste. Reflecting on the meeting, Mr Gammage said: “It was lovely to meet Her Majesty.”

Before he continued: “We talked about what we do and how we do it, she was really interested in all of that. I had the great privilege of meeting her about 15 years ago when she was becoming involved with the Royal Air Force Station, and she remembered that, which was lovely.”

While Fery is back on Wimbledon’s main stage with the winner of his match against Cobolli, taking on either Taylor Fritz, Alexander Zverev or Jiri Lehecka in the last four.

The British wild card made it back-to-back five-set wins by again coming from behind to defeat former world number three Grigor Dimitrov in one of the most impressive Centre Court debuts on Monday.

The 23-year-old entered the tournament ranked 114, with only two grand slam victories to his name and never having won a five-set match.

However, he has already beaten Damir Dzumhur, Otto Virtanen, Zizou Bergs and Dimitrov this year – and Fery ultimately took the first set against Cobolli too.