Andy Murray picks up his first Top 10 win since 2017!
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Andy Murray Alexander Zverev
Andy Murray has a dream start after returning from injury. Murray overcame Alexander Zverev in a tight face-off in the Western & Southern Open second round on Monday. Playing his first tournament of 2020, Murray battled to a 6-3 3-6 7-5 victory over Zverev at the ATP 1000 event.
Granted a wildcard to play at the tournament, Murray upset fifth seed Zverev in his first win over a top-10 player since 2017. Last one vs No. 9 Kei Nishikori in quarterfinals of 2017 French Open when Murray still had original hardware in his hips then.
Andy Murray has reached the last 16 at an ATP 1000 event for the first time since Madrid in 2017, when he was the world number one.
Take a bow, Andy Murray!
There was nothing but admiration for the returning Andy Murray after he scored a hard-fought win. But that was in complete contrast to the unease felt at witnessing another Alexander Zverev implosion.
Murray, 33, has been out of action for nine months after two hip operations. And so, celebrated his return to tennis with a three-set win over Frances Tiafoe on the weekend at the Cincinnati Masters, being played in New York.
The world No. 7 was expected to account for Murray after such a long injury lay-off. But his Achilles heel, his serve, haunted him once again. Zverev has a tendency to completely lose his second serve and so it proved at the crunch.
Serving for the match at 5-4 in the third set, the 23-year-old reeled off three double faults and was broken for 5-5. Murray held to go up 6-5 and serving to stay in the match. Zverev collapsed again, starting the game with two more double faults to make it four on the trot.
All up, five doubles in his last two service games proved impossible to recover from and world No. 134 Murray celebrated his best victory in years — albeit in front of empty stands because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“I fought hard. It’s a good effort to win that after not playing for a while. I’m glad to get through it,” Murray said.
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