COLIN FLEMING last night thanked the Wimbledon medical staff for keeping his men's doubles hopes intact.
On a day where mishaps devastated much of the SW19 field, the Scot also required extensive treatment on court for an injured flank as he and doubles partner Jonny Marray toughed out a 7-6 (6-4), 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 first-round win against Igor Zelenay and Martin Klizan, of Slovakia.
Marray, who won this competition last year, and his Scottish partner are ranked No.9 seeds in this year's competition and they now face Frantisek Cermak and Michal Mertinak for a place in the third round tomorrow.
"I hit a high backhand return at 2-1 in the first set and felt like a dagger in my side," said Fleming.
"It restricted me a little bit so the treatment helped me a lot. The physio was great and thankfully I was able to serve okay which is key in grass-court doubles. We are not playing on Thursday so hopefully I can get a good day's rest. But it would have to be a serious injury for me not to get stuck in."
There was no such luck for Glasgow's Jamie Baker, however, who went down with his young partner Kyle Edmund by a scoreline of 6-4, 7-5, 6-2 to Spain's David Marrero and Italy's Andreas Seppi. Despite a decent grass-court season by the numbers, Baker lost in the second round of qualifying for the singles competition this year, having run Andy Roddick, the three-time Wimbledon singles finalist, close 12 months back.
"I have actually had my best grass-court season yet, even though I haven't had the same wild cards into tournaments like I did last year," he said.
"I have won seven grass-court matches this year, which is something I have never been able to say before. But it is definitely difficult being here not playing but knowing that I can win matches in this tournament. Financially, the difference is humungous. Because whatever you tell yourself, that is not progress."
"This is the first time we have ever played together so to play two such good players was always going to be tough, given that we were just getting to know each other's style of play," said Edmund, who won two junior doubles titles at the 2012 US Open and 2013 French Open with Portuguese partner Frederico Ferreira Silva, "but that is the situation we had to deal with."
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