'Boultercanu' serve delight on historic day at Queen's Club

Moments before Emma Raducanu and Katie Boulter walked onto court one to add a touch of pizzazz to a historic day at Queen's Club, a woman carrying an empty Pimm's jug went to go for a refill. "I'm sorry but if you leave, we won't be able to let you straight back in," she was told by a steward. "You will have to queue."

- Sean Ingle

The woman thought for a moment, looked at the packed stands, and returned to her seat. It turned out to be a wise decision. And not just because the queue to see the British pair – or "Boultercanu" as the press had already anointed them – was snaking halfway around Queen's Club.

For when the action began, Raducanu and Boulter proved to be an instant sensation as they walloped the doubles pair of China's Jiang Xinyu and Taiwan's Wu Fang-hsien 6-4, 6-2. But it was not only the quality of their play in their first match together that stood out. There were also plenty of laughs, high fives and jokes, which continued at the press conference afterwards.

Asked whether they might be tempted to also give the doubles a whirl at Wimbledon, Raducanu played it straight. "We're just going to keep trying to do as best as we can this week and take it from there."

But before she could go on, Boulter interjected: "Scrap what she said," she said with a laugh. "We're going for the Wimbledon title."