THE structural flexibility which allows the world's tallest buildings to gently oscillate in high winds is totally missing from the 6 ft 4 in frame of Goran Ivanisevic. When the gales of tennis troubles blow, he reels and rocks alarmingly, although in truth, even the gentlest of spring zephyrs may see him unexpectedly and spectacularly crash.

The storm cones were raised well before he began his first round match against Sweden's Magnus Gustafsson yesterday evening, for the 30-year-old Swede had won three of their previous four encounters on clay.

At first all was calm, the Croatian winning the first set comfortably enough. "Everything was fine. Everything was going like I wanted. Even when I lost the second and third set I did not think he would beat me." But he did.

"I mean when you have 10,000 break points and cannot win one, you have to pay," muttered Ivanisevic, the fourth seed here, who has never enjoyed much success at Roland Garros, even though in the last two years the courts have played reasonably fast.

So now he heads for grass. "You don't play on grass. You just serve and return," was his cogent response to those enquiring of his chances at Wimbledon. But he was not optimistic, the gloom of this defeat ringing in his head like the scream of swifts around the Eiffel Tower.

"It's going to be tough for me to get motivated for Wimbledon now. If you go there too early to prepare, then you go crazy." Nobody was impolite enough to laugh.

Other than Ivanisevic's creaking fall there were no other great surprises, although the unseeded Jim Courier, twice champion here in 1991 and 1992, lost his first round match against another Swede, Magnus Larsson 6-1, 6-2, 4-6, 1-6, 6-4.

"Today I felt like an alien out there," said Courier. "It was like I was out of my skin. I have not felt like that for a long time in a tournament. I was pathetic."

Many had believed that Courier would have a successful run this year. He had shown determined form on clay prior to Roland Garros but it appears that these days he can no longer cut the mustard or even the cress in the Grand Slam events.

Yesterday saw the opening bow of Steffi Graf and Martina Hingis, who both arrived here with little (in the case of Graf) or no (Hingis) pre-tournament preparation. Both made ultra-rapid progress.

Graf took a mere 55 minutes to dispose of Argentina's Paola Suarez 6-2, 6-3, while Hingis clipped four minutes off this time with her 6-0, 6-2 win over Slovakia's Henrieta Nagyova.

This was Hingis's first match back since she fell off her horse and needed an operation to her left knee. "You are always a little scared after something like that, but I think I've found my rhythm again."

And just to remind you, that rhythm has brought her six titles this year, including the Australian Open, and she is undefeated. No winds of trouble for her. Life is a breeze.

Earlier, all the old arguments about whether or not British players can ever play on clay - disregarding the inimitable Fred Perry - were trotted out again as Tim Henman was put out to Wimbledon grass by the 30-year-old Frenchman Olivier Delaitre. They are largely irrelevant.

Henman lost because he is still struggling to come to terms with his game after the operation on his elbow last March. This was only the fourth match of his comeback and he might well have lost on any surface. His forehand, in particular, continues to let him down under pressure.

The more interesting discussion is whether the British number one has time to mount any sort of challenge at Wimbledon and emulate last year's run to the quarter-finals. This must be doubtful.

Henman's right elbow gave him trouble in Rome during the Italian Open but since then he has been receiving specialised electrode treatment, claiming yesterday the elbow was "a hundred per cent", although cautiously adding that he would not know for sure until he woke up this morning.

Despite this first round defeat there were some signs that Hen man's overall game is slowly, if a little painfully, beginning to come together, although he is clearly still a good way short of his sharpest, both physically or mentally. He needs time and more matches.

That said, Henman should really have won against Delaitre, ranked 159 and 30-years-old this weekend. Court number two is one of those intimate little arenas where the breath of players and spectators almost intermingle. There is no place to hide, no small corner of anonymity.

If there had been, Henman might have crept into it as a series of indeterminate shots and missed opportunities saw Delaitre take the first set 6-2.

There seemed every possibility of an extremely swift exit but an early break of his own in the second set rejuvenated Henman's confidence, his serve began to fizz, and Delaitre's previously tight-knit game began to unravel.

Now it was the Frenchman who appeared down and out. Then, with the score at 1-1 in the fourth set, Henman crucially lost an extraordinary game, lasting 26 minutes and which contained 13 deuces. "If I had lost that, I would have lost the match," said Delaitre, who went on to win 6-2, 2-6, 1-6, 6-2, 6-4.

Henman is good enough to do a lot better here one day although the nearest he may get to Perry's 1935 title is a bottle of Perrier.