WIMBLEDON, England -- Maybe David Neanderthal or Nebulous or Nalbandian or whatever his name is should have missed his starting time -- the way he did at '99 junior Wimbledon when he got disqualified. Or maybe he should have taken off his tennis whites and put together a jig and a net jump -- the way serial streaker Mark Roberts did at a rain break before being escorted away. Or maybe Nalbandian should have paid a few more visits to a Centre Court he'd never seen except for an emergency practice the morning of the last round of the first grass court tournament he'd ever played.

	Lleyton Hewitt played ruthlessly against David Nalbandian.

Whatever he might have done, as soon as the Unknown Argentine did what he had to do -- trod the hallowed ground, armed primarily with a sometimes-nasty forehand and a finely-honed sense of humor -- Lleyton Hewitt, the top seed and No. 1 player in the world, showed him he really didn't belong. Hewitt ruthlessly drilled the poor fellow as if in a backyard frolic -- and turned the tennis championship of the world into a 6-1, 6-3, 6-2 laugher.

Nabandian, ranked 32, had won six matches through the Fortnight, whipping Pete Sampras' conqueror, George Bastl, winning five tie breaks as well as two character-testing five-setters. But he's a baseliner -- and Hewitt's the best at that. He's a quick, speedy grinder -- and Hewitt's the best of those. Nalbandian'd taken advantage of this year's heavier balls, higher bounce and slower grass -- but the pugnacious Hewitt might have been Brer Rabbit in the Briar Patch under those conditions.

Before the match was four games old, Nalbandian had exposed his nerves and inexperience -- or Hewitt had exposed them for him, striking 12 clear winners (against zero errors) -- and Boris Becker, resplendent in his Rod Stewart retro ruffled white shirt in the BBC commentating box, was chuckling at the picture on his monitor of Nalbandian's French girlfriend, Victoria: "But at least that is a beautiful girlfriend he has."

The beauty of the match was almost all from Hewitt's side -- uncontainable rockets from along the baseline, especially his lethal inside-out forehand; depth and weight of shot to all the corners and angles; his vastly improved serve always there to bail him out of trouble spots. As if there were many of those. The worst finals spanking at this venue since John McEnroe thrashed Jimmy Connors 6-2, 6-1, 6-1 in 1984. The match was interrupted twice in the early going for (surprise!) rain -- but the only real suspense came when Roberts, 37, made one of his typical naked forays upon a major event just as the two players were returning from the first delay.

Streakologists will recall 1996 when, just before an equally horrid championship round mismatch between Richard Krajicek and Mal Washington, a fetching blonde rushed nude onto Centre Court. This time Roberts -- who has streaked the British Open at St. Andrews, a soccer final at Glasgow, the Grand National steeplechase and a snooker match, once with a toy puppy concealing his privates -- did the honors. "Why not they get him? He out there five minutes," said Nalbandian later, who nevertheless seemed to, uh, raise his game momentarily, staying with Hewitt for 12- and 15-shot rallies, making him work for his points, even poking some winners himself.

But The Kangaroo Kid -- having escaped the dangerous Sjeng Schalken in the quarters after being down a break twice in the fifth set and then pounding the home favorite Tim Henman in straights in the semis -- wasn't about to let his moment slip. "I couldn't wait for Wimbledon to start this year," said the Adelaide, Australia, native who won the Wimby grass warmup at Queens for the third year in succession (the first since McEnroe to do that). "It's always been a big thing for an Australian to win this tournament. I remember Pat (Cash) 15 years ago winning, watching it with my grandmother. His headband, his fire out there."

Cash also was the first to climb up into the stands to embrace his family and friends after winning the All England. And Hewitt did that, too. "I thought, stuff it, I'm going up there," he said.

Not that the new champ, who watches the series of Rocky DVD's for inspiration and was the youngest player ever to attain the No. 1 ranking last winter, embraces the public and press as much. Nor the stress of the spotlight. There was that time a few years ago when he referred to the "stupidity of the Australian public;" the 2001 French when he labeled an umpire "a spastic;" the James Blake incident at the U.S. Open when he insinuated a black linesman was partial to his African-American opponent. An Australian magazine once rated Hewitt the country's "least admired sportsperson." And of Hewitt's youthful transgressions -- the in-your-face cockiness, the arrogance, all those "C'MON'S" -- Agassi's former coach, Brad Gilbert, once said he'd be "amazed if someone didn't whack him in the locker room."

But nobody's going to whack Hewitt on court any time soon. He may be an enigma, preferring to keep to his sporting family -- father Glynn is a former Aussie Rules Football player, mother Cherilyn is a phys ed teacher, girlfriend Kim Clijsters from Belgium is among the top 10 players in the world -- rather than do media interviews or make public appearances. But so what if he'd rather dress down with his "mates" rather than talk tennis or explore his private life with some sleaze Fourth Estate. What is he, 12?

Naw, he just looks like a pimply pre-teen, even long after he's cut his surfer-rat locks into that new, crewcut, bullet-head look. At any rate, he's the youngest player to win Wimbledon since Becker -- and who's to say Hewitt won't keep winning here on the grass as long as his lightning-quick, groundstroking, bard of the baseline predecessor, Bjorn Borg, did?

As for Nalbandian, he was the last wackiest straw in the wackiest Wimbledon within memory. Neither previous 2001 finalist back in the tournament. Sampras and Agassi and every other American gone before the fourth round. Three South Americans in the last eight. Jennifer Capriati's ex-boyfriend advancing a round further than Jennifer herself. (Not to mention, Xavier Malisse granted a 10-minute reprieve in his losing semifinal to Nalbandian to call his doctor in Belgium about his heart palpitations; apparently, they weren't over The Capster.) Anna Kournikova... Uh, just wanted to envision the name one more time.

Through all this chaos, sure enough, came the weirdest story of all, Nalbandian, just 20, the grandson of an Armenian immigrant to tiny Unquillo, Argentina, in the high Sierra range just outside Cordoba -- who, just to practice for his first Wimbledon, had to persuade his club back in Buenos Aires to mark out tennis court lines on a cricket pitch.

	David Nalbandian was the first man to reach the final in his Wimbledon debut during the Open Era.

Nalbandian wasn't just the first Argentine this or that -- the great Guillermo Vilas won four Grand Slam titles but never got past the quarters at the All England. N-Band was the first man from the South American continent to reach the final -- after Alex Olmedo, the UCLA Bruin from Peru who won the title here in 1959. And the first from any continent in the open era to make the Wimbledon championship round in his debut at Wimbledon. (The last five players who won here in their first visit were all Americans: Bill Tilden, Ellsworth Vines, Bobby Riggs, Ted Schroeder and Dick Savitt.)

Nalbandian had an impressive junior career, beating Roger Federer in the finals of the '98 U.S. Open juniors and finishing third in the world. But when he hooked up with former tour player and countryman Gabriel Markus -- who cherishes being the only player from his country to beat Sampras -- as his coach last season, Nalbandian really took off, improving over 200 spots in the rankings (to No. 47) in 2001 and then winning his first title at Estoril (beating Juan Carlos Ferrero and Carlos Moya) in 2002.

Hewitt's pedigree, however, trumped his opponent in the same way he ripped his game asunder on the court. Ken Rosewall won the French at 18, Rod Laver and Lew Hoad also were champions of majors as infants. But of all twelve Australians who have triumphed amid the leafy glades of SW 19, Hewitt is the youngest.

"Our sport needs a dominant figure," Becker said. "Lleyton is the perfect role model to those kids who should know you don't need to be 6-4, 200 pounds to succeed in tennis. The right attitude. The right technique. You can make it with other stuff. That's his gift."

In 1997, the kid was only 15 years, 11 months, when he became the youngest qualifier at the Australian Open. Four and a half tennis seasons later he's already won 16 tournaments -- with many more to come.

Now if the U.S. and Wimbledon champion can only open up to the outside world -- and show an attractive personal side he reveals only in miniature flashes -- Hewitt might win many more thousands of hearts. And in the process maybe even save an entire sport.

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