by Our Sports Desk

ANDY MURRAY laboured to a three set win against 59th-ranked Mikhail Kukushkin on a scorching Centre Court yesterday.

The Scot made a convincing start taking the first set 6-4 before Kukushkin fought back in the second set.

The Russian-born Kazakh player won four games in a row to take the set to a tie-break, before a reinvigorated Murray made his superior quality count to win the tiebreaker 7-3.

An expectant home crowd roared in-form Murray on as he regained control to win the third set 6-4.

British women’s number one Heather Watson saved an impressive three match points on her way to defeating Caroline Garcia in her first-round match but Laura Robson wasn’t as fortunate as she crashed out 6-4 6-4 to Russia’s Evgeniya Rodina.

Top-10 men’s seeds Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal also eased through their first-round matches with wins against debutant Damir Dzumhur and Thomaz Bellucci respectively.

The soaring temperatures also increased the chances of the heat ruling coming into play. The Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) had a system introduced in 1992 that allows for a 10-minute break between the second and third sets when the heat stress index rises above 30.1°C.

The need for the rule, which only applies to the women’s game, was rubbished by Britain’s Kyle Edmund who said: “For me personally, I think it’s sport. Especially tennis, it can be physically testing and demanding. That’s why we put a lot of hours in on court and in the gym.”

But Maria Sharapova defended the WTA rule, saying: “If it does get quite hot for us, we’re able to use it, then why not?”

The WTA heat rule has been implemented twice before, in 2006 amd 2009, according to tournament referee Andrew Jarrett.