KEY POINTS:
One of Ilie Nastase's Wimbledon party pieces was to go down on his knees, look into the Cyclops line-calling machine after a contentious verdict or unexpected bleep and ask: "Were you made in Russia?"
The 21st century's answer to Cyclops is Hawk-Eye, a computer linked to 10 on-court
cameras which makes a billion calculations on every point in order to rule on line calls.
Hawk-Eye made its Wimbledon debut on Centre and No 1 Court yesterday, Cyclops having been banished to the outside courts.
And, before any player is tempted to ask, Hawk-Eye was made in Britain.
Paul Hawkins' invention resembles Cyclops about as much as Roger Federer's K Factor Wilson racket resembles the wooden implement with which King Henry VIII used to take on all comers at Hampton Court.
First deployed in 1980, Cyclops uses infra-red beams to decide whether a service is in or out. In the early days at least, insects flying in front of the beams used to cause chaos by triggering its bleep.
Rigorous testing has proved Hawk-Eye is unerringly accurate, although that does not always prevent Nastase impressions. Andy Roddick went down on his knees to scan the line after a Hawk-Eye verdict went against him at Queen's last week, though TV cameras showed the computer, as ever, had it right.
Hawkins, 33, who graduated from Durham University with a PhD in artificial intelligence, designed Hawk-Eye with sport in mind but without knowing where his gizmo might be used first. His breakthrough came in 2001, when Channel 4 used it in their test match cricket coverage.
Hawk-Eye had been used only as a TV tool for cricket and tennis until the International Tennis Federation approved its use in tournaments. It is now used at several events, including the US and Australian Opens.
The distinction of making the first Hawk-Eye challenge to a line call on Centre Court fell this week to Teimuraz Gabashvili. Early in the third set of his three-sets defeat by Roger Federer, the 22-year-old Russian challenged an "in" verdict on a passing shot by the defending champion.
Hawk-Eye, it turned out, was right.
Most players, officials and spectators love Hawk-Eye. It takes the sting out of contentious line calls and provides an extra element of drama as everyone awaits the verdict.
Amelie Mauresmo, who with Federer was one of the early doubters, said: "It's entertaining for the crowd and for TV spectators. It's good for us as well, because it just clears our mind on decisions we have doubts about.
"I saw Roddick disputing the Hawk-Eye decision, but I think you look a little bit stupid when you decide to contest."
Power cuts at the US Open and Queen's put Hawk-Eye temporarily out of action, while an inaccurate graphic caused confusion at the Australian Open.
The problem was that the graphic representation of the baseline had been doctored, with the intention of making it clearer for TV.
"That was completely our fault," Hawkins said. "The computer said zero millimetres in, but the bounce mark on the graphic showed one millimetre out, so we contradicted ourselves."
Rafael Nadal still complains about a Hawk-Eye verdict on set-point in his quarter-final defeat to Mikhail Youzhny in Dubai this year. Hawk-Eye agreed with the line judge's "in" call on Youzhny's winner, but Nadal, to no avail, showed the umpire a ball mark which seemed to show the shot was out.
Hawkins explained: "We've used high-speed cameras to show that the width of a bounce mark on a hard court is about a centimetre narrower than the actual total part of the ball that touches the ground.
"At the point where the ball is most compressed it's actually touching the ground with very little force and so that part doesn't leave a mark.
"When we examined the mark it [seemed] actually two or three millimetres out, but because you don't see all of the mark we were right to say it was in.
"But it is an issue because, like on a clay court, while the mark might not be very accurate it is very believable. So there's a bit of a job to be done by ourselves and the ITF - with some help from the media - in educating the players to make them aware of this."
While most sceptics have been won over, there are some who retain doubts - and not just those spectators who miss the eyeball-to-eyeball confrontations between player and umpire.
"I feel it gets overused sometimes," Lleyton Hewitt said. "At the end of sets, players take advantage of the situation to get a bit more of a breather. If you've got a couple of challenges up your sleeve, people use them at the end of the sets for the sake of it."
Hawk-Eye, however, is clearly here to stay - and to expand. It was used by television at the world snooker championship and Hawkins believes there is potential to expand into ice hockey and golf.
He also has a contract with the Premier League to develop goal-line technology and hopes Fifa, football's governing body, will approve a system later this year.
- Independent
The rules
* Players at Wimbledon can make as many successful challenges to Hawk-Eye's line calls as they want, but only three unsuccessful challenges per set (plus one more for a tie-break).
* Two unsuccessful challenges has been the norm, but Wimbledon wanted more because of the critical nature of the serve on grass and the fact that whole matches can turn on one or two points.
* At last year's Davis Cup final players were allowed unlimited challenges, but statistics show that the average number of challenges actually made is similar whatever protocol is used.
