looked some way removed from the greatest champion this tournament has ever had when the late substitute Jordan Thompson dumped the world No1 out of the Aegon Championships in the first round on another sweltering day of upsets, mishaps and drama.
The 23-year-old Australian, ranked 90 in the world and drafted in as a lucky loser
Bobby Orr Jersey Authentic Jersey when Aljaz Bedene withdrew in the morning of day two with a recurrence of a wrist injury, trusted his talent and stuck to a solid grasscourt game behind a big serve on his way to winning 7-6, 6-2 in an hour and 43 minutes. His finishing stroke was his 12th ace.
This was the first time in 137 matches in which Murray failed to break serve. His forehand also found the net more regularly than a North Sea pilchard but there could be no question the Sydneysider deserved what he rightly described as the biggest win of his career.
He said: “I was just trying to keep composed and land as many first serves as possible. I definitely wasn’t the favourite out there. First-serve percentage was key, Andy’s a great returner. I wanted to push forward as much as possible. You can’t trade from the baseline with Andy. I wouldn’t say this is my favourite surface. I like the blue hard-courts of Australia.”
It was a minor calamity for Murray a fortnight before he goes to Wimbledon to defend his title. If there was a glimmer of consolation it might have been the fact the French Open finalist Stan Wawrinka also went out in the first round, lifting the absent
http://www.officialbostonbruins.com Novak Djokovic to No2 seed at Wimbledon. That will keep Djokovic and Murray apart until the final – if either of them get that far. The world No32, Feliciano López, shared 32 aces with Wawrinka over an hour and half to win 7-6, 7-5.
Murray’s critique of his own match captured the essence of the defeat. “The first set there was not much in it. I made some mistakes in the middle of the tie-break, which gifted it to him. From 3-2, I served a double fault and then played a poor drop-shot on the 30-all point. That wasn’t a great of period of the match for me.
“And then in the second set I had a love-40 game, didn’t get it, got broken soon after that. The game where I got broken to go double-break down, there were some pretty good points in that, some grass-court points where it can go either way. But I didn’t create loads of chances really. I didn’t return particularly well. He served big. He served well.”
Murray did not get off to a blistering start, taking 10 minutes to hold serve, but Thompson could not cash in on a double-fault and three chances to break. By the time they got to the tie-break a fourth Murray double-fault
and Thompson’s eighth ace made the difference.
“He returned very well,” Ward said. “He served to the lines and didn’t give me much chance. There were times in the last eight, nine months that I thought I might not be able to play again because I had so much pain in my knee. So, for me, [just playing] is a bonus.”
The first shock of the day was the elimination of 2016 finalist Milos Raonic, who found the returning Australian
Adam Foote Youth Jersey prospect Thanasi Kokkinakis too strong in the key points of two tie-breakers. Kokkinakis, still troubled by shoulder pain that had kept him off the Tour for 18 months, said: “Best win of my career and to do it so soon after coming back on such a long layoff is a huge confidence booster.”
Liam Broady was reinstated in the draw as another lucky loser after the Frenchman Pierre-Hugues Herbert withdrew with a back injury, but he lasted only an hour and a quarter against Jérémy Chardy, who won 6-4, 6-4. There was little between them, though. Broady saved four of seven break points before the power of his opponent’s serve told.
Dan Evans’s hopes of playing at Wimbledon look slim. He withdrew from Eastbourne on Tuesday, two weeks after pulling a calf muscle at Surbiton and one week after being seen on crutches at Nottingham.
In Halle, Roger Federer bounced back from his defeat to Tommy Haas in Stuttgart last week by beating Japan’s world No66, Yuichi Sugita, 6-3, 6-1 in only 52 minutes. In the second round, he will play Germany’s Mischa Zverev, who beat the qualifier Lukas Lacko 6-4, 6-4.
The British No1 had little time to adjust to the courts at the Edgbaston Priory Club after
http://www.officialpittsburghpenguins.com/Adidas-Bryan-Rust-Jersey reaching the final of the Nottingham Open on Sunday. There she suffered a shock loss to Donna Vekic, and the world No7 was in trouble again when she trailed 5-2 against Ukraine’s Tsurenko in the second set. But Konta won three games in a row and then took her third match point in the tie-break to win 6-3, 7-6.
In the second round Konta will face the big-serving American Coco Vandeweghe, who defeated Christina McHale 6-4, 6-2. The Briton has faced Vandeweghe twice before, with Konta victorious on both occasions, but this will be their first meeting in five years, and the first match between them on grass.
“She’s a very big player,” Konta said. “She’s got a lot of firepower, a lot of weapons. And I know she enjoys the grass.” Vandeweghe, the world No30, reached the quarter-finals of Wimbledon two years ago and the fourth round last year, and she was a semi-finalist at this year’s Australian Open, where she lost to Venus Williams.
Petra Kvitova marked her return to grass with a 6-2, 6-3 victory over her fellow Czech Tereza
penguins Youth Jersey Smitkova. The two-time Wimbledon champion was a wildcard entrant into the tournament after making a quicker-than-expected recovery from the serious hand injuries she suffered when she was stabbed by an intruder six months ago. She made her comeback at the French Open, losing in two tight sets in the second round. She said: “I’m glad that now I can focus on tennis, especially on the grass.”
The 27-year-old, who next meets Britain’s Naomi Broady, was content with both her performance and the condition of her hand. She added: “I had good timing on the court today and I’m happy with the way I played. We are still worried about the hand, so we are not practising that much. We still have days off to work on my hand, and it was very good today.”
