Henman held up

With the clock on the scoreboard twinkling 9.18pm in the Wimbledon gloaming, Henman's first round match against Spain's Carlos Moya was called off for bad light with the score 6-3 1-6 5-7 6-2 5-5.

They will come back on Tuesday to finish off three hours and seven minutes of the sort of action which has made Henman such an institution on the lawns of SW19.

Henman's serve was smooth and his volley crisp i nthe first set. The fourth game was key, Henman producing a series of backhand winners and eventually gaining the breakthrough on his fourth break point.

The rains came on a stop-start afternoon as Henman was serving for the set but he returned after an hour and a half to save a break point and deliver two unreturnable serves to take the set.

And his second set simply stank the place out as the unforced errors gushed from his racket.

But Henman duly dug in as both men found their best tennis. Henman had two break points on Moya's first service game but could not convert.

Worryingly, however, Moya was beginning to read the Henman serve and the Spaniard broke in the 11th game before serving out with a powerful ace to take control of the match but again Henman rallied, taking the fourth set as the Spanish challenge faltered.

And so it went to the fifth - and it looked as if Henman's chance had gone when Moya broke serve in the third game but back again came Henman, feeding on the crowd's support and breaking back courtesy of a Moya double fault.

He should have won it before the light closed in, spurning four chances on match point in the 10th game. But then with Henman nothing is ever straightforward.