WIMBLEDON: Perhaps it is a sign of the days ahead but as Scotland's Andrew Murray was holding his victory press conference after beating a player 166 places higher than him in the world rankings, Tim Henman was a set down on Centre Court to a player ranked 61 places below him.
Henman finally came through against Jarkko Nieminen but not before taking the nerves of the entire Centre Court crowd on one of his defining roller-coaster jaunts. In the end a gutsy fight-back from two sets down may have done the sixth seed more good than would a straight-sets win.
Nieminen would have known Henman before yesterday, whereas Switzerland's George Bastl admitted he knew nothing of Murray before stepping on Court 2 at noon and losing 6-4, 6-2, 6-2.
Why should he know Murray, who plays largely on the junior circuit?
It was a triumph for the young Scot, who is increasingly touted as a likely top-10 player. The potential to become that was clearly on view as he applied his strong baseline game to the grass and held his nerve for an encouraging win in his debut Grand Slam match.
Murray is one of six Britons to receive wild cards into the event, and Wimbledon is just the third tour-level event he has played. At a month over 18 years, he is also the second-youngest man in the draw.
But there was little sign of callowness or nerves. Following a fall during the Queens tournament and a fit of cramping, there had been doubts over his fitness. But those concerns were quickly allayed, the straight-sets win arriving more easily than expected.
"I played pretty solid the whole match," said Murray. "I didn't make any mistakes. I served very well. I don't think he had a break point on my serve in the whole match."
Henman would like to have been able to say the same. Dropping the first set 3-6 and the second in a tie-break 6-7 (5), Henman was in peril as the critics circled. To his credit he turned it around, winning the next three 6-4, 7-5, 6-2 in three hours 31 minutes.
"I kept hanging in there. That's pretty much all there was to it. I was really struggling with all aspects of my game. I was nervous and that probably added to it," said Henman. "I'll be looking to play better on Thursday."
The only realistic US hope in the 128-man field, Andy Roddick, followed on from winning the Queens title two weeks ago with a first-round win over Jiri Vanek.
Roddick, seeded two, didn't hang around and except for a brief delay in the second set, which he won on a tie-break, was popping in serves that should make all of his opponents apply serious work to their ability to guess correctly.
Sweeping the 100th-ranked Vanek aside 6-1 and 6-2 in the first and third sets with 140mph-plus serves, Roddick was largely at his thunderous best and believes he is in the same sort of shape that earned him a tilt at Roger Federer in last year's final.
With Andre Agassi's likely retirement because of injury at this year's US Open and none of the other American players coming through in numbers, Roddick is not unaware of the pressure.
His position is like Henman's but on a greater scale, though Roddick delivered a US Open in 2003.
"It's (pressure) part of it. It's part of the whole deal," he said. "I have two options. Accept it or drop out and be 60 so we have nobody. I mean if I didn't want pressure, I'd go make sandwiches somewhere."
Roddick now meets Daniele Bracciali, who took over four hours to beat Ivo Karlovic 6-7 (4), 7-6 (8), 3-6, 7-6 (5), 12-10. Karlovic hit 51 aces in the match to Bracciali's 31.
Don't expect rallies against Roddick.
Nineteen-year-old Rafael Nadal advanced too. Much to the delight of the Centre Court crowd, the sleeveless French Open champion beat America's Vince Spadea in a smoother than expected passage.
In only his second visit to the grass, Nadal came through impressively 6-4, 6-3, 6-0.
