Andy Murray rediscovered some of his best tennis to save his place in the 2014 ATP World Tour Finals at the O2 Arena in Greenwich, beating Milos Raonic 6-3, 7-5 to set up a showdown with Roger Federer in the last group match on Thursday tomorrow night. If he had lost to the off-key Canadian, his season was over but he played with the required intensity in front of a loud, sell-out crowd.
Federer, who beat Raonic handily on Sunday and has already qualified for the semi-finals, looked superb on Tuesday in a straight-sets win over Japan’s Kei Nishikori, who had beaten a lacklustre Murray in the tournament’s opening match. Nishikori plays Raonic , so Murray will go into his contest knowing what he has to do.
“For me it depends on the winner of the Nishikori/Raonic match,” said the Scot. “If Kei wins, then I need to beat Roger, it depends on the scoreline of that match with Kei and Raonic. If Raonic wins, then I know that all I need to do is win the match against Roger and I’ll be through. I’m not going to know that until I get ready for the match because I can’t predict the future.”
This will be the 23rd meeting between Murray and Federer over 10 years and in the head-to-head they each have 11 wins apiece. “I played him in my first ever final in Bangkok,” Murray said. “It was a great experience then, as it has been every time I’ve played against him.
“ They are matches I’ll look back on when I finish playing. They’re the matches that I really remember, playing against the top guys in the big events.”
Murray, energised by the fans and playing in front of his mother, Judy, as well as her Strictly Come Dancing partner, Anton Du Beke, was aided by some dreadful serving and loose groundstrokes by his opponent. Raonic’s first-shot accuracy dipped as low as 38% in the first set. “To be frank, my first-serve percentage shouldn’t have been above 40%,” he said. “I started hitting serves 115 miles an hour to get it past 50%.” he said. His forehand was even worse, unforced errors on that wing handing Murray 23 of the 128 points contested. “I thought he played well,” Raonic said, “but I didn’t do my job.”
Statistics aside, Murray deserved his win and is in considerably better shape to face Federer – although, given the complicated format, he could lose and still go through, or win and be eliminated, depending on the result and score from the afternoon match between Nishikori and Raonic.
