In the first nine games of that critical third set, Mecir had a total of six break points and Edberg only one. But Mecir began the tenth game with a double-fault and was then engulfed by a sparkling stream of service returns and lost the game to love. Edberg had won a set but was this a reprieve or a pardon? The fourth set, almost a replica of the third, failed to answer the question. Edberg was serving at 3-all and 15-40. In the first seven games Mecir had six break points, Edberg one. But in the eighth game, Edberg struck again. A loose volley by Mecir took Edberg to break point. Another tame shot by Mecir gave Edberg time to play a perfect top-spun lob on the backhand. Edberg held service for the set but a series of blazing returns gave Mecir a break to 3-1 in the fifth set. Could Edberg get up off the floor again? He could and he did whirling about the court with feverish energy to win four games at a cost of only two points.

That left Edberg a break up instead of a break down: and at 5-4 he served for the match. An ace took him to 40-15. Then Mecir lobbed him. Edberg raced to the back of the court, turned, and hit a flat forehand so violently that Mecir who could not have been much more startled if someone had tossed a grenade straight back to him dumped a backhand volley into the net. With that, Mecir strode over the net to congratulate a winner who, three times, had looked defeat in the face without flinching. There was much more to this match than the high drama of the last three sets. Here was the perfect contrast between the service and volley specialist and an artful craftsman who served and volleyed tidily and, for much of the match, produced a series of blazing service returns that challenged belief.

Edberg's service is not to be taken lightly. Not by normal human beings, anyway. But as Edberg loped to the net in the hope of playing finishing volleys, Mecir's flashing returns sang past him like yellow bullets. By the time Edberg knew which way to lunge, it was too late. ``The Big Cat'' was facile, fluent and deceptive. He used hardly any spin, except when fading his forehand. But his timing was delectable.

Edberg had begun well. He was looking sharp and confident and he was ``reading'' Mecir's game more easily than most players do. But in the ninth game Edberg's morale was punctured by a double-fault and three fierce returns. Thus we entered a phase in which Edberg, having served, merely swayed in the draught as a return sped by him and then turned to take another ball and go through the same routine again. He began to look baffled, embarrassed, slightly glassy-eyed. Hard though it was to believe, he lost four consecutive service games: and in an hour and a quarter was two sets down. Midway through the third set, everything was going wrong for Edberg. A mis-hit return stayed up on the roof, perhaps in gutter or drainpipe. In the next game the service line monitor bleeped, indicating a fault, before Edberg had even served. Mecir had also benefited from a few net cords.

Suddenly, though, it became clear that Edberg was in no mood to lose, that the fat lady had yet to start singing. Energy poured into Edberg. He leapt about the court with burning zeal. He adjusted his toss, put more spin on his service, and volleyed with maniacal fury. And what had always been a delightful spectacle was transformed into a great match.

Let us leave the last words to Edberg's coach, Tony Pickard. ``Everybody's been saying that he hasn't got a lot of guts, that there's not much fire in his belly,'' he said of Edberg. ``He's made an awful lot of people look silly.''