Novak Djokovic landed twice in the first set on the pants, but the top favorite avoided a sensational first-round slip on the damp Wimbledon pitch.

In the hunt for the 20th Grand Slam title, the Serb won 4: 6, 6: 1, 6: 2, 6: 2 against the British Jack Draper on the rainy opening day in London.

The 19-year-old left-hander is only number 253 in the world and was there thanks to a wildcard.

Djokovic was initially unable to take advantage of a number of opportunities on Monday, but prevailed after exactly two hours and another rough landing.

His French Open final opponent Stefanos Tsitsipas, on the other hand, lost on the first day as did Laura Siegemund.

The Greek lost 4: 6, 4: 6, 3: 6 to the American Frances Tiafoe, Siegemund was largely without a chance after five hours of waiting due to rain at 1: 6, 3: 6 against the Russian Jekaterina Alexandrowa.

The matches of Philipp Kohlschreiber against the Canadian Denis Shapovalov and of Mona Barthel against the Chinese Zhu Lin were postponed to Tuesday.

Seven Germans qualified

A total of seven German men and four German women are qualified for the main draw. This Tuesday, Alexander Zverev, Angelique Kerber and Jan-Lennard Struff will play their opening games one after the other on the covered place number one from 2 p.m. Zverev meets the Dutch qualifiers Tallon Griekspoor, the 2018 winner Kerber meets the Serbian Nina Stojanovic and Struff meets world number two Daniil Medvedev from Russia.

When the traditional tournament, which was canceled last year due to the coronavirus pandemic, returned, half of the 15,000 seats on Center Court were allowed to be filled - the fans frenetically cheered on their brave compatriot Draper. "He played well, he fought, it was a unique opportunity for him," said Djokovic and was happy about his 25 aces and sets two to four. “It was a very good performance,” he said.

As the winner of the previous Wimbledon edition, Djokovic was allowed to play the first match on Center Court two years ago, the roof of which was closed due to rain. A good two weeks ago, the 34-year-old won his 19th title at one of the four most important tournaments at the French Open. With a triumph at Wimbledon, he would catch up with the record winners Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal in the Grand Slams. The real Grand Slam - the triumph at the four largest events in a calendar year - and Olympic gold are also goals in Djokovic's mind.

The tournament opened half an hour ahead of Djokovic and Draper by Aryna Sabalenka from Belarus, who was fourth in the world rankings 6: 1, 6: 4, and the Romanian Monica Niculescu.

At this point, Siegemund and Yannick Hanfmann should have played against the Czech Jiri Vesely long ago - but due to high humidity and then rain, the organizers repeatedly postponed the start of the matches on the outside courts.

Aside from the typical weather problems, the organizers also received other bad news.

The British Johanna Konta had to withdraw at short notice on Sunday evening because she was classified as the first contact with a person who tested positive for the corona virus.

The 30-year-old has to go into a ten-day quarantine.