MIDDLE Saturday is traditionally the day on which dozens of leading sports men and women are invited into the Royal Box, and they were certainly out in force for Andy Murray's third-round match against Andreas Seppi.

True, their ranks had been depleted a little bit by the time the contest began a little after 6pm, as Judy Murray had defected from the hallowed enclosure to support her son from her usual place in the players' box, but they were still there by the dozen.

Boxer Nicola Adams, cricketer Jimmy Anderson and former rugby player Bill Beaumont were just the start of the alphabet. In fact, Beaumont was just the start of a small pod of rugby names, which also included England coach Stuart Lancaster, former England scrum-half Matt Dawson and England captain Chris Robshaw.

All right, and the legendary Brian O'Driscoll from Ireland too, but you get the picture: could we not invite the odd Scottish rugby player to watch our greatest ever Scottish tennis player? Only the most genteel, diplomatic members of Vern Cotter's squad should be considered, of course. Someone like Jim Hamilton, for example.

In fact, if Murray gets to the final for the third time in four years, we can only hope that the All England Club will have learned the error of its ways and invite a host of his compatriots for the big occasion. As it was, Scotland was represented by cyclists Neil Fachie and Craig MacLean, the aforementioned Judy Murray, Davis Cup captain Leon Smith, and athlete Jo Pavey's husband and coach Gavin. It should be said, though, that the figure who attracted most attention from the Centre Court crowd was the one in the front row who looked like a well dressed but sunburned turnip, Boris Becker.

"Boris, Boris, give us a wave", chanted a group of men dressed in pink T shirts with miniature Union Jacks sticking out their hats. And Boris duly obliged with a little hand gesture - the very sort of thing that had got him into trouble last week when he admitted making such encouraging signs to his player Novak Djokovic during matches, something that is at best a grey area under tennis law.

If you're wondering how we all had time to scrutinise the Royal Box and speculate about possible other guests, not to mention directing chants at Boris, the reason is simple: Seppi was pants. Sagging, baggy pants. In fact, for the first two sets, the Italian gave pants a bad name. He was Z fronts.

After the use of that "give us a wave" chant, it seemed appropriate that other songs more commonly heard at football grounds should be given an airing. "You're not very good", for example, could have been directed at Seppi as he slumped to a 6-2 loss in the first set. Or, somewhat less plausibly at a venue which always places a premium on polite behaviour, "This is so f****** easy" as he lost the second by the same score.

It should be said that, no matter how nervously Seppi was playing during those first two sets, Murray was playing extremely well. It was the same formula as his previous match against Robin Haase, and perhaps it even caused some of the crowd to become a little bored and lose their focus.

After all, this match was scheduled to be third on, after Roger Federer and Petra Kvitova, to provide the BBC with some captivating primetime viewing. But, although it got going at the back of six, this hardly rivalled Doctor Who for suspense. There were no hide-behind-the-sofa moments. Not, at least, in the first two sets.

Then came the drama of the two medical time-outs, first for Seppi then for Murray, which saw the players' fortunes seesaw. As Murray clutched his shoulder on the way to losing the third set, there was a double worry. First, if he kept playing like this he could lose the whole match. And second, if he scraped through, would it be with the sort of damage to his shoulder that fatally compromised his hopes of getting any further?

Suddenly, the bland simplicity of the first two sets became appealing again. Neutrals might have been delighted by the massive momentum shift, but the rest of us decided we would rather have the security of the first two sets than the risky business of the third.

But, just as treatment to his leg had worked wonders for Seppi, so manipulation of his shoulder got Murray back on track. He quickly took charge of the fourth, and ended it with an imperious ace. By that time we had long stopped paying attention to the Royal Box. We had our own tennis royalty to applaud.