ATP: Blake, Safin, Henman post opening wins at Big W

Wimbledon, England (Sports Network) - American James Blake, former world No. 1 Russian Marat Safin and four-time semifinalist Tim Henman of Great Britain recorded first-round wins Tuesday at Wimbledon.
The ninth-seeded Blake handled Russian Igor Andreev 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 on a dry day at the All England Club. Andreev beat Blake's fellow American star Andy Roddick in the opening round at the French Open last month.
The 26th-seeded Safin, a two-time Grand Slam champ, got past South African Rik De Voest 7-6 (7-5), 6-4, 7-5 on Day 2 of this grass-court fortnight.
Meanwhile, an unseeded Henman needed two days to upset 25th-seeded Spaniard Carlos Moya 6-3, 1-6, 5-7, 6-2, 13-11 on the famed Centre Court. The two ATP veterans were tied at 5-5 in the fifth set on Monday when play was called for the day due to insufficient light.
The 32-year-old Henman blew four match points against Moya on Monday and needed three more on Tuesday to finally close out his 30-year-old counterpart, who capped his stay here with an untimely double fault. The total match time was ultimately 4 hours, 11 minutes.
Henman is trying to give Britain its first male champion here since Fred Perry way back in 1936.
In other action involving top-16 seeds, No. 12 Frenchman Richard Gasquet cruised past Czech Bohdan Ulihrach 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 and No. 15 Croat Ivan Ljubicic, fresh off his grass-court title last week in The Netherlands, held off American Vincent Spadea 6-4, 6-4, 4-6, 7-6 (7-4).