Wimbledon Day 1: Ruben Bemelmans of Genk

Curtain Call

Player: Ruben Bemelmans
Age: 23
Nation: Belgium
Current Ranking: 163
Today's Result: lost to Julien Benneteau (France) in five sets


Photo via ATP World Tour

Bemelmans went through qualifying to reach his first-ever Grand Slam main draw. Just saying his name with his city of birth - Ruben Bemelmans of Genk - is almost enough to make one want to learn Flemish. Seriously, try it!

Seeing the June sun shining on a natural grass court is good for the soul. The retractable roof was put to good use as well, allowing for a full day's schedule on Centre Court even if that didn't quite work out for the rest of the grounds. Tomorrow will be unavoidably jam packed as a result.


My Tennis Fantasy

Once again, I played it safe and went with the top 5 seeds: Nadal, Djokovic, Federer, Murray and Soderling. All five have strong history on grass. Daniel Gimeno-Traver of Spain sure looked like he was going to make things interesting in his match with Murray today but the Great Scot won the last 15 games of the match to squelch that idea. For what it's worth, Nadal is my pick to win.