BRITAIN'S big two are safely through to the second round of Wimbledon.

Kyle Edmund defeated Alex Bolt 6-2 6-3 7-5, while Johanna Konta had a 7-5, 7-6 (9-7) victory over world No 88 Natalia Vikhlyantseva .

The 21st seed Edmund was in complete control during the first two sets of his first-round men's singles and did not drop a point on his first serve while breaking Australian qualifier Bolt four times.

The third set was trickier, with 2017 Aegon Ilkley Trophy runner-up Bolt breaking Edmund for the first time and serving for it.

He forced a set point but Edmund saved it and reeled off four games in a row to win.

Yorkshireman Edmund said: "I'm just really happy to get through the first round of Wimbledon.

"There's always that long preparation where there's lots of thinking ahead, excitement, anticipation, you've got the media, all that stuff to do.

"So to get the first round out of the way, play well, I'm very happy with.

"What a setting to do it, first time playing on Court One in singles. Tricky third set but it shows how well I was playing and thinking to come back and win it 7-5."

Meanwhile, Derby teenager Jay Clarke, a quarter-finalist at Ilkley last year, was narrowly beaten in a five-setter on his Wimbledon debut by experienced Latvian Ernests Gulbis.

The 19-year-old took the first set against the former world No 10, and hauled the match back to 2-2 after losing the second and third.

However, Clarke was left still waiting for a first grand slam event win after Gulbis wrapped up a 4-6, 6-3, 7-6 (7-3), 3-6, 6-4 victory.

A jittery Konta needed six match points to dispatch Vikhlyantseva in the first round.

But the British No 1 said she was pleased with how she controlled her nerves.

"It was a tough match," said Konta. "She has a big game. She hits quite tricky on grass. She made me work for it very hard.

"It was a great match for me to have. It was a great match for me to battle through and fight through until literally the very last point.

"I think it's the tough matches, the ones where there's quite a bit of ebb and flow, when you save set points or you save break points, those are the matches where you come away feeling quite tough.

"I think I have control over how I'm able to compete.

"Granted, I was probably nervous (during the match points), but I felt I did the best I could to crack on.

"Nerves are going to be there. Nerves are there for everybody. I am definitely not special in that sense.

"I think I competed well. I dealt with the occasion. If it was going to go into a third, I was going to continue to compete, I was going to fight very hard."

Vikhlyantseva, 21, is a talented but inconsistent player with only one grand slam event win to her name, yet she still managed to give the 22nd seed plenty of problems.

A break point for Konta came and went in the seventh game, with the 27-year-old slipping on the baseline as Vikhlyantseva's forehand wrong-footed her.

The pair were locked at 5-5 but two double faults, a clubbing Konta forehand and a long backhand from Vikhlyantseva secured the break.

Having served out the opening set, Konta immediately broke again, turning an awkward-looking return into a breathtaking cross-court winner.

But a sloppy service game allowed Vikhlyantseva to level matters at 4-4 and Konta then had to fend off two set points on serve.

In the tie-break those first five match points came and went but Konta made the sixth count with a forehand volley to progress safely – if not entirely convincingly – to round two.

Konta faces Dominika Cibulkova next.

The Slovakian presents a danger after only missing out on a seeding when Serena Williams was bumped up from her ranking outside the top 100.

Meanwhile, Garbine Muguruza said it was business as usual after getting the defence of her Wimbledon title off to a winning start against former Woodhouse Grove pupil Naomi Broady.

The Spaniard was the queen of Centre Court in 2017, beating Venus Williams in the final, and she enjoyed her return there with a 6-2, 7-5 success over the British No 4.

She made slightly hard work of it in the second set, but eventually got the job done in an hour and 30 minutes.

Gabi Taylor, one of four British women to receive wild cards into the Ilkley draw, put up a brave fight but her maiden senior Wimbledon outing ended in a three-set defeat to Eugenie Bouchard.

The 20-year-old, who was also handed a wild card into the main draw at Wimbledon, was beaten 6-0, 4-6, 6-3 by the 2014 finalist.

Taylor hit the headlines in 2016 when she thought she had been poisoned after having to pull out of the girls' quarter-finals, but it was later confirmed to be a virus.

She endured a torrid first set against Bouchard, which she lost without winning a game in only 21 minutes.

To her credit, the British No 6, ranked at 180, restored some pride in the second set by claiming a crucial break at 4-3 and then serving it out.

Bouchard, who secured her main-draw place at Roehampton last week, shook off her wobble and won the decider in convincing fashion.

Matthew Ebden, runner-up to Dennis Kudla in the 2014 Ilkley final, put out tenth seed David Goffin (Belgium) 6-4, 6-3, 6-4, while hard-serving American Taylor Fritz beat Italy's Lorenzo Sonego 3-6, 6-3, 6-2, 6-2.

Bradley Klahn was another American victor, beating Yuichi Sugita (Japan) 2-6, 7-6 (8-6), 6-2, 6-2.

Meanwhile, 2017 Ilkley runner-up Alison Van Uytvanck (Belgium) defeated Paula Hercog (Slovenia) 6-2, 6-2.

But there were defeats for Peter Gojowczyk (Germany) – to fifth seed Juan Martin del Potro (Argentina) – Marius Copil (Romania), Christian Harrison (United States) and, in the women's singles, for Qiang Wang (China) and Denisa Allertova (Czech Republic), who lost 6-2, 6-2 to 28th seed Anna Kontaveit (Estonia).