Wimbledon 2011 - day six live! | Paolo Bandini
Hit F5 for the latest or select the auto-refresh button below
Follow all the latest scores on the official live scoreboard
The full order of play for Saturday's action at SW19
In pictures: our pick of the best images from day six
Email your thoughts to paolo.bandini@guardian.co.uk
You can even follow Paolo on Twitter, if that's your thing
12.36pm: "Any further news on that queue & the reasons for the delay," asks Liessa below the line. I can confirm from our very own Jamie Jackson the official line offered by Sporting Intelligence earlier on, which is that Wimbledon officials were "acting on information recieved regarding a potential protest". Beyond that, we're still with the conspiracy theories.
12.30pm: Watson and Rae have come roaring back (all British athletes, we know, are partial to making their comebacks in the style of a lion) in their mixed doubles match against Lefevre and Rodina, and now lead 4-3. Rae just held serve to, though not before an epic point at 30-15 in which Watson twice had to scamper back from the net to retrieve lobs at the baseline. The high-five percentage, if anything, seems to have dropped now they're actually winning points.
12.22pm: Could this picture from earlier this morning offer some clues as to the true reason for the delay at the gates? We wouldn't want to jump to conclusions, but it appears to show Tim Henman taking part in a game of mixed doubles with no less than four partners on court with him at the same ! time. Co uld this be a radical LTA experiment to save British tennis? Is this why the Spanish were so unhappy? The people deserve to be told.
12.14pm: Out on Court Five, Heather Watson suffers a brave defeat (all British defeats, as we know, are either brave, or spirited) on serve in the opening game of her doubles match with Jocelyn Rae against Sophie Lefevre and Evgeniya Rodina. After each point the British pair high-five - relentlessly enthusiastic even in the wake of rubbish volleys into the net cord. I blame the Bryans for this nonsense.
12.08pm: Not much of a conspiracy theory, but perhaps the beginnings of an explanation of the delay at the gates from Sporting Intelligence on Twitter:
Wim spokesmn: "Acting on information received that there might be a potential demonstration we have been taking some actions to prevent it." Police helicopter above Wimbledon. Potential protest apparently involves Spaniards. Reasons unknown.
12.01pm: The senior players are making their way out onto the outside courts, but the delay opening the gates means many fans with tickets are still stuck outside. "The Queue stretches all the way down the road on both sides," notes my colleague Anna Kessel, while the tennis blogger @FortyDeuceTwits tweets:
Calamity at the gates. 50 minute delay in opening the gates means a queue that actually looks longer than the actual Queue.
11.54am: Play traditionally starts on the outside courts at noon, but with the junior competitions getting underway today, any visitor (or at least any visitor lucky enough to have found a way in the gates) strolling around the outside courts will have been treated to the sight of miniature Pete Samprases and Steffi Grafs crushing the ball back and forth across a net that in some cases seems to be higher than their eyeline. Roger Federer himself was so startled at the height of the nets on his first entry into the junior tournament here, back in 1998, that he demanded the ump! ire take a measurement to confirm it did not exceed regulations. He still won the tournament, though, naturally.
11.52am: Oh yeah, you can also get the full order of play for day five here.
11.48am: If you're looking for something to keep you entertained between updates this morning, then you can catch up on yesterday's action with all our reports, or indeed our award-winning snapper Tom Jenkins's picture gallery. Alternatively, if you've read something brilliant elsewhere, why not let us know below the line.
11.45am: Drama at the gates of the All England Club this morning, as your not especially intrepid live blogger arrived just in time to be shut out of the grounds.
The press entrance was closed for all of about one minute before being reopened, but the mysterious voice from the sky inside the media centre suggests others were made to wait much longer, with gates that would normally open at 10.30am being kept shut until 11.15am. As yet, I do not have an explanation, so in the meantime do feel free to suggest outlandish conspiracy theories of your own.
Both the women's No1 Caroline Wozniacki and the men's No1 Rafael Nadal are in action today - facing Jarmila Gajdosova and Gilles Muller respectively - but that's not the half of it. Today also sees Novak Djokovic take on Marcos Baghdatis, Roger Federer up against David Nalbandian, Serena Williams taking on Maria Kirilenko and a rather tasty looking encounter on Court Two between Juan Martin Del Potro and Gilles Simon.
And if you're ju! st here for the Brits then I have good news on that front too. Five home doubles pairings are in action today - Jocelyn Rae and Heather Watson, Anne Keothavong and Laura Robson, Colin Fleming and Jocelyn Rae, Kenneth Skupski and Elena Baltacha, Jamie Delgado and Melanie South. As a great man once said: woof.
Comments