Andy Murray endured three days of back pain to end 37 years of hurt as Great Britain made it to tennis’s Davis Cup final for the first time since 1978 by defeating Australia 3-2 in Glasgow. The nation could only watch with a mixture of admiration and bewilderment as the Scot ground out decisive victories on three consecutive days. “I tried to concentrate on hitting the right spot on the serve. I wasn’t really thinking about history or anything like that,” said Murray, ever the master tactician, after the decisive singles win over Bernard Tomic. Britain’s reward is an away trip to Belgium, after their 3-2 win over Argentina in the other semi-final.
Vettel’s Singapore cash-in
Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel won the Singapore Grand Prix as Formula One served up a rare diversion from the usual cocktail of tyre politics and lopsided racing. Runaway drivers’ championship leader Lewis Hamilton was forced to retire after his Mercedes car suffered a power failure, but most controversial was the sight of a man staggering on to the track midway through the race as officials scrambled to avert a serious accident. “It looked as though he had come straight out of a nightclub,” Red Bull team principal Christian Horner said. “I am sure the FIA will be having a good look to see how the crowd can be prevented from ending up on the circuit. It is not only dangerous for him but very much so for the drivers.”
Gloucestershire’s big day out
County cricket enjoyed an unexpectedly balmy late season outing at Lord’s as unfashionable Gloucestershire shocked Surrey to win the Royal London One-day Cup final. The six-run victory was also a fitting career finale for England’s 2005 Ashes hero Geraint Jones, whose 50 runs set Gloucestershire up for an unlikely success. “I just feel very lucky to finish this way,” Jones said. “Very few people get the chance to walk off and lift a trophy and look back on such a great day.” Elsewhere tributes were paid to the former International Cricket Council chief Jagmohan Dalmiya, who died in Kolkata last Sunday aged 75.
Chelsea stop the rot
Premier League champions Chelsea restored order to football’s gilt-edged but brittle universe, arresting their poor start to the season by beating nine-man Arsenal 2-0. Blues boss José Mourinho celebrated by watching New Zealand beat Argentina at the Rugby World Cup: “I go because I love it,” he smouldered. West Ham then threw the cosmos back into existential disarray with a 2-1 win at leaders Manchester City, a result that lifted the east Londoners up to second, a giddying experience that Hammers boss Slaven Bilic likened to being in “a pub full of girls”.
