Andy Murray may have grabbed all the headlines today, but who was the smiling, bespectacled man wearing 154 who handed over the Torch to the world's fourth-best tennis player in front of an excited, expectant crowd at the All England Club late this afternoon?

None other, of course, than insidethegames editor Duncan Mackay (pictured below).

This is the second time Mackay has carried the Torch, but to do it on home soil, at one of British sport's most iconic settings must have been a particularly special moment for one of the most respected names in Olympic journalism.

As the sun beat down on a crowd that included dozens of local Wimbledon schoolchildren and was at times four deep in number, Mackay appeared wearing the trademark London 2012 Torch Relay suit having been handed the Torch by television presenter Lisa Snowdon.

Duncan Mackay receives the Olympic Torch from television presenter Lisa Snowdon

For the next 300 metres, he was cheered along Church Street before handing over to Murray outside the gates of the All England Club, where Britain's top tennis player recently made history by reaching the men's singles final.

On a personal level, it may have taken me two hours to get this green and pleasant corner of West London and two hours to get back, but seeing the Torch Relay for real brought back memories of being there when it all began at Land's End several hundred miles away when sailor Ben Ainslie kicked off the proceedings.

Now, like then, watching Mackay carrying the Torch whetted the appetite both for Friday's Opening Ceremony and the subsequent two and half weeks of sport when sports that so often remain in the background get their moment to shine, showcasing courage and heroism and propelling little known athletes into the global spotlight.

Bring it on...

Andrew Warshaw is a former sports editor of The European, the newspaper that broke the Bosman story in the 1990s, the most significant issue to shape professional football as we know it today. Before that, he worked for the Associated Press for 13 years in Geneva and London. He is now the chief football reporter for insidethegames and insideworldfootball. Follow him on Twitter.