Henman rolls on through

13 April 2012

Tim Henman's form was as sparkling as the Paris sunshine as he took his place in the fourth round of the French Open this afternoon for the first time in his career.

The British number one, despite playing in a midday temperature of 27 degrees, showed no signs of the mystery virus which had sapped his energy this past fortnight, as he swept to a convincing 7-6 6-1 6-2 victory in just one hour and 54 minutes against Spain's Galo Blanco.

It was a ruthless demonstration of how to win on clay by being aggressive and keeping the points short to preserve his power levels.

And now Henman has the perfect opportunity to go deep into a tournament which in the past he has treated largely as a way of improving his fitness in preparation for Wimbledon.

He plays French wild card Michael Llodra in the fourth round, a man ranked 94 in the world, 85 places behind him, and who has never won a title on the main tour.

And with Andre Agassi and Andy Roddick having already departed from his side of the draw the prospect of a path to the semi-finals is becoming increasingly realistic.

Henman had admitted he had never felt as comfortable on clay as this season and it certainly looked that way.

But if it was his serve, solid and reliable, which laid the foundation it was his ability to mix baseline rallies with the perfect time to volley which was the key to this victory.

True, he had to work harder against the Spaniard, who is ranked 95 in the world, than in his first two matches at Roland Garros, but once he had wrapped up the first set tie-break 7-3 there was only one winner.

A screaming forehand saw him break Blanco's serve in the first game of the second set. With it seemed to go Blanco's resolve as the confidence oozed from Henman's racket.

He was beginning to give Blanco, who he also beat here two years ago, a lesson in how to hit winners on the red clay on which for so long he has struggled.

And while a scrambling Blanco somehow managed to break Henman's serve in the sixth game, having saved three set points, as the Briton's concentration lapsed momentarily, Henman immediately hit back to notch his fourth break to take the set.

The third set saw Henman lose his first service game and then rally to exert his obvious superiority and in this form he is going to be a serious challenge to even the best clay-courters.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in