Cheer up Laura – you made £530 a minute for losing!
BRITAIN’S Laura Robson crashed out of Wimbledon yesterday – but left with £ 5,000 prize money.
That works out at £5 0 for every minute of her 66-minute tie against Brazilian Beatriz Haddad Maia.
For Miss Robson, 2 , who had been handed a wildcard, it was the third consecutive year she had lost in the first round.
The British hopeful, who was ranked number 27 four years ago, has seen a significant chunk of her career blighted by a wrist injury. She said of the match: ‘I thought I had a really good chance. With the way that I’d been playing the past few weeks, there is no reason I couldn’t have won that match. Yeah, I just let myself down.’
It is her quickest exit from Wimbledon so far, playing for just one hour six minutes compared with one hour nine minutes last year. At times, she appeared to be overcome with emotion but when asked, Miss Robson said: ‘I felt emotional, but I wasn’t close to tears. I was more angry at myself.’
She was cheered on by fellow British player Katie Boulter, 20. Another wildcard, Miss Boulter will today make her Wimbledon debut against America’s Christina McHale.
British number one Johanna Konta won her first match in straight sets against Hsieh Su-wei after shrug- ging off injury fears. Miss Konta, 26, said she felt ‘no pain’ despite pulling out of a game at Eastbourne last week following a bad fall.
And British number four Aljaz Bedene caused an upset last night after beating Croatian favourite Ivo Karlovic in a five-set thriller.
The Slovenian-born player, 27, beat the world number 2 – who is 6ft 11in tall – in a 4-hour 25-minute match which saw each set go to a tie break.