WIMBLEDON, England -- The siblings had talked about it for a long time, dreaded the occasion, feared it, hated it. They knew it would be sad, disappointing, melancholy, not to mention virtually impossible to live with afterward. Fighting against family. Battling your own blood. Resolving to rough up your relative. Especially when everybody knows the fix is in. "Well, if it had been any other tournament, we would have fixed it. But at Wimbledon you just can't do that," echoed not the Williams sisters but tennis' other siblings, the not so necessarily rockin' Rochus Brothers.

	Belgian brothers Christophe, right, and Olivier Rochus were only the second brothers to play against each other at Wimbledon in 104 years.

That would be Christophe, 23, and Olivier, 21, who -- comparative to those statuesque sisses trodding the top of the rankings on the women's side and regularly seeded to face each other in the final rounds of major events -- are virtually tiny tots from the tiny town of Auvelais, at the tip of the Ardennes in Belgium. Rochus, pronounced Roke-Us, peres are 5-foot-7, 150 pounds and 5-foot-5, 130 pounds respectively -- this is not a misprint -- young, mostly obscure journeymen who eat and train and live together and who on Monday journeyed far across the channel to the All England Club and the grand opening day (meaning the sun came out) of the grandest Grand Slam of all, only to face on the opposite side of the net -- each other.

"It could have been worse, we could have gone all the way to the Australian Open to have to play the first round," said Olivier, who won. "It was awful, no fun, no motivation, total merde!" said Christophe, who lost. The scores were 6-2, 3-6, 7-6 (6), 6-0 on Court 14 -- an obscure, no frills lawn just opposite the Press Centre, above which the international television networks station their cameras to send out background scenics to the universe. The setting of the Rochus confrontation -- in which the chair umpire would signify points by mere first names: "Advantage, Christophe," "Game, Olivier" -- was just as far removed from the Williams' normal stomping grounds as was their sparkling, consummate serve-and-volley, rabid competition. Until, of course, the last set when older brother C, who's nicknamed "Rokkon," rocked out, hit the Could-Give-A-Flip wall and got, uh, shall we say, Belgian Waffled at the minuscule hands of brother O (or "Ollie"). By that time, however, the unfairness of the whole thing had become overwhelming.

"I mean, we both love to play on the grass, we get excited about Wimbledon -- unlike some guys who just show up and don't even try. We're so anxious waiting for the draw to come out," Christophe said. "But this year it was like ... go up, go up, go up ... then boom, fall down. Especially after this bad year I've had. (He's won but three matches in an injury-plagued season.) This whole thing was awful. I think it was just as bad for him."

Christophe pointed to Olivier, who was sitting beside him at their postmatch press conference -- fancy that; the Williamses will appear together for their media grillings when South Korea gets a bad call in the World Cup. Moreover, the brothers good naturedly explained their feelings about the difficulty of playing each other.

"Psychologically, this was not easy," said Olivier, who is ranked No. 64 in the world and whose first language, like his brother (ranked No. 85), is French. "Not only did we have to play (in the) first round, but we knew the winner probably must play (Marat) Safin. It feels like my tournament hasn't even started yet and it's maybe over." (O. Rochus did take the second-seeded Russian to five sets, however, in the recent French Open.)

	“	We shouldn't have to train together, live and work together, do everything together to have to play each other in the first round. I don't feel like I've been at Wimbledon at all. I don't feel like losing. Or like winning. ”
		— Christophe Rochus

The Rochuses were asked if they could sympathize with the much-discussed predicament of the Williamses. "First of all, I don't watch women's tennis," Christophe said. "Second, the Williams sisters are always playing in finals of Grand Slams. They are already happy at making it so far through the tournaments. That is the perfect moment for them. (Third) Olivier and I are just playing to stay around for a couple more days."

C and O have been sub-commanding officers of Belgian tennis -- Xavier Malisse is the country's No. 1 -- for a couple of years now, the blue-eyed, blond-haired pocket dynamos becoming in 2000 the first brother combination to finish in the top 100 since the Blacks of Zimbabwe. Christophe -- whose Rod Stewart hair fluff thing makes him appear younger than his brother who favors the shorn short investment banker ("I'm losing it") look -- actually out-ranked Olivier last year (69 to 113). That's even as the younger sib had put together the far more impressive career results. It was Little O who was deemed one of the best juniors in the world at 14 (and no, not the dwarf division); who won some professional points at 15; and who in 2000 not only beat Magnus Norman at Wimbledon and helped lead his country back into the Davis Cup World Group but also won his first tour title at Palermo -- the shortest ATP winner since Angel Gimenez two decades earlier.

To win that event, Olivier had to defeat none other than Christophe in the semifinals -- avenging his elder brother's victory in their only previous meeting in a challenger tournament in Ostend. "But that hardly counted and when we played in Palermo it was both our debuts in a semifinal, so we were both very happy," Christophe said. "This," -- he waved his hand in dismissal of Monday's match -- "was so awkward, really bizarre. ... We've talked about this a lot. That it could happen, it might happen. But we never thought it'd be real, to meet in the first round of a Grand Slam. (Olivier) is my brother, not my opponent. We shouldn't have to train together, live and work together, do everything together to have to play each other in the first round. I don't feel like I've been at Wimbledon at all. I don't feel like losing. Or like winning. I don't believe my brother played better than me, just that he has more experience on the big points. (Olivier now is 4-2 career at the Big W; Christophe 1-3) The whole thing was rotten from the start."

That's about the time the brothers were asked if they tried to "do something" about such a pairing. And about the time they said the first round of Wimbledon is "not the place for the fix." That got about as big a laugh as them dooming themselves for a second-round pairing against Safin.

"I hope my brother wins, but I'm going home. I'm fed up," Christophe said.

But what about the youngest Rochus brother, Pierre, a lawyer who was arriving Tuesday just in time to miss his siblings rivalry? Or their parents, Jean-Paul, a doctor, and Anne, a dentist, who had left their respective practices to show up in the leafy London suburb to make the whole thing a raucous Rochus family affair. Sounds like at least the older folks believe in the glass half full.

"Oh, they were fine with us playing each other," Christophe said. (Or was it Olivier?) "It meant at least there'd be one in the family to get through the first round."

Curry Kirkpatrick is a senior writer for ESPN The Magazine. E-mail him at curry.kirkpatrick@espnmag.com.