TIM HENMAN, despite his recent struggles to regain his best form since his elbow operation in March, has been seeded 14th in the men's singles at Wimbledon, which begins next Monday.

Henman, who yesterday climbed from 22 to 20 in the latest world rankings, would probably not have been given a seeding had it not been for the late withdrawals through injury of Thomas Enqvist of Sweden and Spain's Alex Corretja and Albert Costa.

In fact, there are six players ranked above Henman who will not be at Wimbledon. Spain's Sergi Bruguera had earlier pulled out through injury and two other Spanish players, Alberto Berasategui and Felix Mantilla, both clay court specialists, had decided not to enter.

Henman's inclusion among the 16 seeds makes him the first English player to be seeded since Buster Mottram in 1982.

Twelve months ago, when he also became the first English player since Roger Taylor in 1973 to reach the quarterfinals at Wimbledon, Henman gave British tennis its biggest boost for years.

Wimbledon's seeding committee have been bold. Unlike other Grand Slam championships, they have based their findings more on grasscourt form than on world rankings.

American Michael Chang and Austrian Thomas Muster, who are two and four in the world and shine on slow clay courts, have been relegated to fifth and sixth positions. This is to allow twice runnerup Goran Ivanisevic, the bigserving Croatian, to be seeded second behind world number one Pete Sampras. Russian Yevgeny Kalelnikov and reigning champion Richard Krajicek of Holland have been seeded third and fourth.

But perhaps Wimbledon's boldest move has been to give Australian Mark Philippoussis, winner of the Stella Artois tournament on Sunday, the seventh seeding spot. Phillippoussis now holds 13th spot in the world rankings.

After taking into consideration the players who are absent, the big hitting Aussie should have been seeded 10th, but he has been given priority over Marcelo Rios of Chile, Carlos Moya of Spain and the French Open champion, Gustavo Kuerten, who are all better on clay. Boris Becker, three times champion, has also been moved up to eighth place, even though on rankings he would have been 12th.

This should ensure a better championships for too often clay court players have been seeded too high and have been eliminated early, frequently ensuring a lopsided draw in the later stages.