Spain’s world number one Carlos Alcaraz gained a comfortable first-round win against Jeremy Chardy, who played the final singles match of his career.
Alcaraz, the reigning US Open champion, needed less than two hours to secure a 6-0 6-2 7-5 victory on Court One.
The 20-year-old restricted his 36-year-old opponent to only seven games.
Frenchman Chardy reached the last 16 in 2014 and has already said Wimbledon would be the last time he plays in a singles tournament in his career.
“I played really well and at the beginning of the match in the first set he was in a little bit of trouble,” said Alcaraz.
“I’m really happy to play at a great level and to get through. It’s really beautiful to play here and I’m really happy to have a lot of people supporting me.”
Jeremy Chardy first played at Wimbledon in 2008, when Carlos Alcaraz was just five years old
Chardy was playing at Wimbledon for the 14th year and has been as high as 25th in the world rankings.
“He’s a different generation because I’m close to double his age,” Chardy told the ATP Tour website before the match.
“For me it is an emotional week because it will be my last tournament in singles so it is a gift to have the chance to play against him.”
Queen’s champion Alcaraz is aiming to become the third youngest player to win the men’s Wimbledon singles’ title in the Open Era, behind 17-year-old Boris Becker in 1985 and 20-year-old Bjorn Borg in 1976.
His performance in the opening two sets was near-flawless with Chardy struggling to contain his opponent’s serve and producing a number of double faults at key moments.
Alcaraz needed only 22 minutes to take the first set and broke Chardy’s serve in the opening game of the second as the victory looked to be a formality.
Chardy did finally get a game on the board by winning the fourth game of set two, receiving a superb reception from the Court One crowd for doing so.
At two sets down, Chardy restored some pride in the third set and managed to break Alcaraz’s serve in the sixth game, only for the Spaniard to instantly get the match back on serve a few minutes later.
Alcaraz then broke in the 11th game and served out the win to set up a second-round meeting with another French player – either Alexandre Muller, 84th in the world, or Arthur Rinderknech, two places higher at 82nd.
