Explained: What is a 'lucky loser' in tennis and how is one selected?

Elias Ymer and Nuno Borges are two of the 128 players who made the first round of Wimbledon 2022. A lucky loser is a player who loses a match in qualifying, but then enters the main draw to replace the qualified individual. It must be clarified, lucky loser can only take a qualified player’s place if the main drawn player’s withdrawal happens after qualifying tournament has started and before the first point of their match gets underway. The official Grand Slam rulebook defines it as, “Lucky Losers are those players who have lost in the final round of the Qualifying competition or, if more Lucky Losers are required, those players who have lost in the previous qualifying rounds.” Theoretically, everyone who plays in qualifying can be a lucky loser. The rule book says, “Lucky Losers shall be selected based on the rankings used for the determination of qualifying seedings as follows: The order of the four highest ranked players shall be randomly drawn, thereafter the order shall follow the players’ rankings, unless there are more than two main draw withdrawals at the time the Qualifying competition is finished in which case the size of the random draw will be the number of withdrawals plus two.” Why select players randomly and not on merit of rankings?