If Laura Robson was relieved to just be back on the SW19 courts where she reached the fourth round two years ago before a debilitating and frustrating wrist injury kept her out for 18 months, she did not show it.
Understandably rusty in defeat to the Russian Evgeniya Rodina, losing 6-4, 6-4, Robson was all plaintive looks skywards, muttered self-admonishment and frustrated glances at her coach, Mauricio Hadad.
Her throw was niggling her on her serve and groundstrokes were bouncing just long or thudding into the net. Her serve in particular seemed to be misfiring. Ten double faults and just 28% of second service points won told their own story. At one point, as another groundstroke drifted wide, she yelled to herself: “Make her play the ball, Laura.”
Then occasionally she would send one of her trademark double handed backhands flashing past her Russian opponent and kindle memories of 2013, when she reached the fourth round.
On her competitive return following 18 months out with a wrist injury sustained before last year’s Australian Open and exacerbated during it, Robson managed to win just one game in defeat at Eastbourne.
So this was an improvement on that at least. She could not have asked for a much kinder draw against an opponent ranked 101 in the world. After her Eastbourne defeat she joked that Hadad had told her afterwards that there was just one thing she needed to work on – “everything”.
Robson, who needed a wildcard after dropping out of the rankings from a 2013 high of 27, has conceded that it will take time to put her game back together. But she showed she had lost none of her fighting spirit.
There were lengthy games in both sets, with Robson saving a break point during an attritional six-deuce sixth game in the first set. In the next she failed to convert a break point of her own in another flurry of deuces.
Then, in a passage of play that seemed to sum up her frustrating afternoon, she threw her next service game away to hand the initiative to her opponent.
In the pivotal third game of the second set, Robson lost her service game to love. The 21-year-old kept battling to the end, including during a controversial denouement when Rodina had run out of challenges and could not hide her fury when a ball was called long on match point. But it was only temporary relief for Robson, as the Russian finished things off.
“We still love you, Laura,” cried a lone voice as she departed.
