Gael force! But Monfils speed record is chalked off

GAEL MONFILS thought he had made Wimbledon history with a 150mph serve yesterday, only for the record to be taken away from the Frenchman within half an hour. The initial reading would have been the fastest ever recorded at the All England Club but Wimbledon later deemed it an error by the speed gun on Court 2. It means Taylor Dent’s 148mph serve in 2010 remains Wimbledon’s quickest of all time, followed by Milos Raonic and Sam Groth on 147mph in 2016 and 2015 respectively. Monfils went on to cause an upset by beating No 23 seed Richard Gasquet in straight sets after seeing the 150mph flash up on court mid-match. He was later told that his record had been taken away from him. ‘I saw that, I saw 150,’ said world No 44 Monfils, who triumphed 7-6, 7-5, 6-4 in his all-French battle and faces 36-year-old Italian Paolo Lorenzi next. ‘But then I don’t know if it’s good or not. It was cool. It would have been nice, yeah. But 150 is super fast. It was strange, actually. But anyway, I’m happy the way I am. Still, my record is 142, so it’s very cool. ‘Today was good. I was happy. Straight sets. Stats can be better, but, yeah, I think I was solid. I was happy about that.’ HawkEye later analysed Monfils’s serve after suspecting a speed gun malfunction and said it was in fact around the 135mph mark. Milos Raonic unsurprisingly secured the fastest serve of the opening day of Wimbledon. The Canadian with a cannon for an arm clocked 142mph. Venus Williams was the fastest of the women as she hit a serve of 123mph. The wind took its toll at the All England Club yesterday, making life difficult on the outside courts, and arguably aided those with big serves.