Graf still winning at love 30

It must be hard hitting 30 as a tennis champion. You look around and you see the 18-year-old, courtesy car generation of Venus Williams and Anna Kournikova pouting and snarling at your heels. You have another teenager, Martina Hingis, trying on your crown for size when you are out injured. At 30 you watch your back.

Approaching the twilight years, Steffi Graf, however, wasn't entertaining much in the way of fear. Emboldened by her defeat of world number one Hingis in the French Open final just over two weeks ago, the seven-time winner coasted past Ludmila Cervanova and into the second round 6-1, 6-4 in 44 minutes.

The young wannabes came safely through with her. But Graf, basking in her elevated status, was unfazed. "The women's game has definitely improved in terms of players being fitter and having more power and having more strengths," she said. "Yeah, at times obviously I've been struggling to train enough and I sure can't work out as much any more as I used to. So I'm trying to keep up with it on the court and I'm feeling pretty fit."

There was little to add about the German's clinical performance, save her reluctance to leave all that space behind her to come to the net. Graf sees the back of the court as an open prairie, a landing pad for killer lobs and passing shots. So she didn't leave it very often.

Because she holds 21 Grand Slam titles, her displays are often judged in a harsher light, but yesterday her scything forehand and speed around court were still in evidence after two years largely out of the game following injury and family turmoil.

"I've prepared well and I'm ready for the next round and nothing else right now. It's not going to be easy," she added.

Williams, ranked sixth, was impressive in her own aggressive, can-do-it, must-do-it way, and was typically less the poodle and more the doberman in walloping Miriam Oremans.

A 6-1 first set followed by a more faltering 7-5 finish gave the American the result, but not perhaps in the style in which she wanted to win. Still, the teenager appears to know her weaknesses.

"I just think in general I get over confident and I lapsed some," she said of the dogged second set. "That's something I have to watch out for in the future. At least I don't have a problem with being under-confident."

Indeed, no one has ever accused Williams of selling herself short since her father predicted, when she was about five, that she and her sister Serena would win Grand Slam tiles. But in the second set she was broken three times and forced to struggle.

"I think sometimes she came in and took the opportunity more before I could, or before I would," she said. "Oddly enough I forgot to serve and volley, which is odd, but I definitely started out strong. I just think the base line is in my blood and I couldn't get it out." It was left to Monica Seles to complete yesterday's squad of big names who pulled through the nervous first round. The Serbian-born, naturalised American beat Spain's Christina Torrens-Valero 6-3, 6-1. A winner of nine Grand Slam events, Seles has never won at Wimbledon, though she reached the final in 1992. The attack the following year by a deranged Graf fan probably deprived her of the chance, and since then has won only one Grand Slam, the Australian Open.

In France, Seles did not look totally fit, although she retains the blistering ground strokes that took her to such early successes in her career.

The other seeded players, Amanda Coetzer (12), of South Africa, and Sandrine Testud from France, also came through safely to round two. Kournikova dismissed Barbara Schwartz.

Kounikova, asked if the press attention distracted her, replied: "No, I don't think about it. It's the same. I just concentrate on my tennis. I'm here to play."

She also denied a romantic link with Brazilian soccer star Ronaldo and announced that she was no longer seeing ice hockey star Sergei Federov.