Mjd - no you're not missing anything, I was looking at the 2006 rule book - see my edit a couple of posts back shortly before you posted.

Count - good idea, I'll email someone.

So then, I began the day watching Bloomers and it didn't start off too well. He went 2 sets down pretty quickly, just wasn't playing agressive enough and Peya looked like he was strolling through the match. Bloomers was making too many errors, just hitting weak shots into the net, while Peya was hitting winners and playng a lot more solid and more consistently. There was quite a big crowd there, possibly about 200 and John Lloyd and James Ward were watching quite a lot, as well as loads of other LTA guys I didn't recognise.

I didn't fancy seeing Bloomers lose a 3rd set as tamley as he lost the first two, so went to watch Eaton. He served just as well as his 2nd round match, but this time he cut out the DFs which made him nearly impossible to break. He was serving at least two aces a game, and even the few times he missed his first serve, his second is just as good. I can't really believe Eaton has done relatively nothing the rest of the year when he has so much potential. He has totally outplayed two solid Challenger level players, and it's impossible to imagine Patience was ranked over 500 places higher than Chris. There were quite a few people watching Chris as well, possibly more than watching Bloomers. Famous faces included Boggo, Skupski (I think), Tara Moore, Cox and I think some of the other younger players, although I don't really know what they look like.

You can sort of see both courts at the same time, or at least the scoreboards, so I knew Bloomers was making a comeback. At the end of the 4th both he and Peya walked past the Eaton match for a toilet break. So throughout the Eaton 3rd set I was sort of watching both matches, although I was still sitting at Eaton's court. Once Bloomers got to 4 all in the 5th I went back to concentrate on his match. He seemed to be playing a lot more aggresivley than in the 1st and 2nd sets. He must have realised if he didn't change something he was going to get rolled over in straights. I'm afraid to say that for his match point it was a Bloomers error. He had a chance to hit a winner down the line, but his shot hit the very top of the net. Just an inch higher and he would have won the match. After that he went back to playin like he did at the beginning, and the game he got broken he made loads of errors. He saved two mps, one with a great lob, but a 3rd was too much and it wasn't to be.

I took some videos and quite a lot of photos which I'll try to upload now. I was hoping to get both Eaton and Bloomers winning in the same vid, but not this time. Chris was very pleased with his win, and walked round with a huge smile on his face for the rest of the day.

Thanks Josh.... I'll add that onto the report I've just put up as it's good to have something on it from someone who actually saw what happened in the match

Gosh ... maybe I was the only person to email them. I just checked my emails and found one from the AELTC's web producer saying that he has double-checked with the referee's office and and has amended the website accordingly.

It does sound like the original mistake didn't come from the referee's office, which is something of a relief!

It is all a bit confusing with the rules being different for Futures/Slams and ATPs/Challengers and the Slam rules having changed twice in the last 3 or 4 years.

Incredible Steven, well done, I cant believe anyone was working at that time of night

Some Bloomers pics.

Well now we know why he lost - he's not wearing his lucky qualifying lurid green top!

Seriously though, thanks for the pics Josh.