Men's Main Draw Begins

The men's main draw got underway today. Although it was mostly qualifying matches, there was a smattering of first round ties and even a doubles match.
Guillermo Garcia-Lopez has significant rankings points to defend, having reached the semi-finals here last year. He narrowly avoided an upset, overcoming 33 year old Frenchman Marc Gicquel 7-6 in the third, after over two hours. In that decisive tie-break, Gicquel was persistently complaining a la Andy Murray. Not quite sure what about - my guess is he may have felt, at nearly 7pm, that the grass was becoming slippery; or it may have been line calls. The absence of hawk-eye was noticeable last year, as it was earlier this year in the similar Brisbane tournament.
Due to the late-finish to this match, the doubles -originally scheduled for Centre Court - had already been moved to Court 1.
British pair Colin Fleming and Ken Skupski have surprisingly risen up the rankings in recent months, and won ATP titles in Metz and St Petersburg towards the end of last season. They took on Israel's Andy Ram and Austria's Julian Knowle.
Accomplished doubles player Ram has also made an impact in singles in Eastbourne before. In the 2006 Davis Cup tie, he won the first two sets against Andy Murray, before the Brit came back to record his first ever five-set victory. Ram received some vocal support from a few in the crowd this evening, but it was the British pair who recorded another impressive win - 6-4, 7-6.