Marathon men Isner and Mahut meet again

American John Isner and France’s Nicolas Mahut were improbably drawn to face each other in Wimbledon’s first round yesterday, in a repeat of their marathon 183-game epic at last year’s cham-pionships.

Isner and Mahut slogged their way into tennis history last year when their first round duel became the longest match in tennis history, a gruelling 11-hour and five-minute game over three days.

When it was over, Isner had clinched a 6-4 3-6 6-7 (7/9) 7-6 (7/3) 70-68 first-round victory.

Twelve months later and the two journeymen are set to do it all over again when Wimbledon gets under way next week. Isner is adamant that the records set in last year’s match will never be broken.

“It won’t happen again,” he said.

“Not even come close.”

Since last year’s duel Isner and Mahut have become firm friends.

“Honestly, before Wimbledon, we’d never said one word to each other,” Isner said of Mahut.

“Now we text each other quite often and I’ve got to know that he’s a really class act and a really good guy.”