Andy Murray’s thirst for making history could not be denied here on Sunday – even by lingering but passing pain in his back – and will be further slaked when Great Britain contest their first Davis Cup final in 37 years.
They play Belgium away in November, after Steve Darcis’ 6-4, 2-6, 7-5, 7-6 win over Argentina’s Federico Delbonis in Brussels on Sunday evening gave them a 3-2 win in the second semi-final.
If Great Britain were to win the competition for the first time since 1936, when Fred Perry ruled, Murray would further be confirmed as the player who single-handedly has dragged British tennis out of one of the longest lulls in sport, although there is much work left to do.
The world No3 secured a place for Britain in the final with his third win in three days here on Sunday, his 15th straight in Tour-level singles against Australians. He handily beat their highest-ranked player, Bernard Tomic, 7-5, 6-3, 6-2 in the first reverse singles, to go with his straight-sets win over Thanasi Kokkinakis on day one and the doubles triumph alongside his older brother, Jamie, against Lleyton Hewitt and Sam Groth on Saturday.
The younger Murray, who looked worryingly near collapse in the first set of that match, started slowly against Tomic before hitting a rhythm, conclusive evidence of the physical strain he was under – exacerbated, he revealed afterwards, by pain in his back that surfaced five days ago.
“I wasn’t concerned about how much I had left in the tank,” he said. “I was more concerned about my back. My back had been giving me a lot of trouble this week, the few days before the tie as well.”
The team captain, Leon Smith said: “There was a long conversation with Andy and the other team members, the trainers and the physios, and we came to the conclusion that it was the right thing to play Andy.”
The Murray brothers also combined to beat France in the quarter-finals at Queen’s a week after Wimbledon. That was greeted rapturously but nothing could match the reception that enveloped the 8,000-seat Emirates Arena when Tomic’s final weary shot went long after 1hr 46min. They even stayed for the dead rubber, when Kokkinakis beat Dan Evans 7-5, 6-4.
