Tennis fans camped out to score the best seats as thousands of people joined the famous Wimbledon queue on the first day of the SW19 tennis tournament.
More than 6,200 people were waiting in line for on-the-day tickets this morning, with some having turned up as early as Saturday.
Among them was Julia Barker, who was first in the queue, with her husband Nicky, 54, and son Dan, 23.
The family, who have lived in Ireland for over 20 years but are originally from Latvia, arrived at 7.30am on Saturday.
Dan said: ‘We didn’t expect to be first. Then we realised there was nobody here.’
Love Island 2017 winner Kem Cetinay opened the first gate for the queue at 7.18am after a short countdown and yelled ‘Let’s go’ before running through the checkpoint.
Wimbledon sells a bulk of its tickets through a ballot system months ahead, but as these get snapped up fast many people will join the daily queue for on-the-day tickets.
The tournament remains one of the few major sporting events where you can pick up premium tickets – including for Centre Court – on the day of play.
There are two types of ticket available: Show Court and Grounds tickets. They are sold on a best available, one per person queuing basis and are non-transferable.
Show Court tickets are for Centre Court, No.1 Court and No.2 Court, while Grounds Pass tickets enable you access to all courts including No.3 Court, Court 12 and Court 18, as well as The Hill, where action is shown from Centre and No. 1 Courts.
You can find out more about queuing for on-the-day tickets with our full guide to The Queue here.
Among the stars hoping to hold the trophy this year is seven time winner Novak Djokovic. If he’s successful he’ll equal Roger Federer’s record.
Two-time Wimbledon champion Andy Murray also joins the competition, after winning Surbiton and then Nottingham Open in recent weeks, meanwhile Nick Kyrgios, Rafael Nadal and Emma Raducanu are both missing the event due to injury.
For the full schedule and this year’s seedings, visit Metro.co.uk’s guide here
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