Also, it is hard to remember the last time when there have been so few upsets in the first week. The top six of the eight are very much intact. The 1996 champion and fifth-seed Richard Krajicek was the biggest casualty crashing out to qualifier Laurenzo Manta of Switzerland. Third seed Yevgeny Kafelnikov, was victim to a hamstring injury than any rivetting tennis from his opponents in the third round. Carlos Moya, seeded 12th, was first of the two players who fell to the sheer determination of the former world number one American Jim Courier.

Ranked 196th Manta turned giant-killer on the concluding of the first week by outgunning the huge Dutchman in what was by far the biggest win for the Swiss. The nativeof Winterthur, whose Italian-born father Leonardo played Davis Cup for Switzerland, not only edged the big-serving Krajicek in aces -- 24-23 -- but also returned better, the key to his victory.

Yet, without doubt, it was the thinly-built Serbian girl who scripted the most unusual of big wins in women's tennis history. The 16-year-old Jelena Dokic, coming in through the most plebeian route -- the qualifiers --ruffled the most famous feathers in the women's pecking order in that second day upset of Martina Hingis. It was one of the most unusual first round matches ever seen in a long time and also brought into sharp focus the pressures of being a talented teenager in women's tennis.

There was another teenager, all of 17 years, who first battled to get out of her father's iron grip and then battled injuries to barge into the fourth round. Mirjana Lucic, the Croat, put the Yugoslav-turned-American Monica Seles in her place.

Women's tennis is replete with such stories of girls trying to cope with pressuresfrom parents and then on the courts and then finally cracking at the age of 20. Jennifer Capriati, at 23, is almost finished with her career as a professional tennis player. She even offered to help players like Dokic, mentally, as they embark on a career which is fraught with dangers -- not necessarily from the tennis court.

Indeed, it will be a long haul for Dokic to try and win Wimbledon but then the pressure may already be telling. Her beating Hingis doesn't guarantee her a shot at the title, as she rightly pointed out, but the media has already reached the spartan surroundings where she and her family live on a very down market scale. It is not known whether any marketing agents have approached her father, Damir, to buy a couple of inches of her shirt sleeves, which is presently devoid of any trappings of a star in the making.

Dokic may have begun her journey in the right way, but there is another who is trying to end his in as good a manner as possible -- Boris Becker, whose journey into the Hallof Fame began here in 1985. Fourteen years on, the man has returned for his final hurrah. It is not so much his determination to win the title as his chance to cap a career with a momentous run in the fortnight which he has loved the most.

But then, there are other legends who have safely made their way into the second, and crucial week of the tournament. Pete Sampras may not be playing exceptional tennis but he has cruised into the fourth round without dropping a set. So has Andre Agassi after his new-found confidence gained from the French which has made him the favourite here. There, however, have been the two Brits, who going by the media reports, cannot lose to anybody here. That could be pardoned because for a nation starved of heroes, Tim Henman and the imported Greg Rusedski can give the nation more hope than anything else.

Then of course there are the Indians, Mahesh Bhupathi and Leander Paes. Riding on the French Open confidence they have done well so far. But their real test starts from Monday.They can make it provided they play true to form. That is the problem.