Andy Murray was not born the last time Great Britain played in the semi-finals of the Davis Cup, in 1981, but the 28-year-old world No3 stood tall in the sunshine at the Queen’s Club on Sunday after just about single-handedly securing the dream tie against Australia in September.
Murray’s win against Gilles Simon ensured Britain’s first Davis Cup success against France – the 2014 finalists – since Buster Mottram and John Lloyd led a 3-2 victory on the clay of Roland Garros in 1978. It is also five years since Great Britain were engaged in a virtually anonymous struggle against Turkey to avoid dropping into Europe/Africa Zone Group III, the tennis equivalent of football’s League Two. Leon Smith has been the Great Britain captain since July 2010, during which time the team have risen from the edges of irrelevance to the verge of winning a competition drawing on the talents of players from 126 countries.
“It’s been a long journey from Eastbourne against Turkey, when we started,” Smith said. “There wasn’t much interest in our team because of where we got to but we quite quickly established as a group. James [Ward] was there, we established how we were going to work and it was involving that bench, a team of pretty much British coaches that had to really roll up their sleeves and work hard and be passionate about it.”
Murray attributed Great Britain’s Davis Cup revival to Smith, whom he has known since childhood in Scotland, and to the team he has assembled around him.
“He is surrounded by really good guys and people that really care about the outcome of the matches,” Murray said. “They’re here for all of the right reasons. Everyone in the team gives everything, from the first day we turn up to practice right through to the end.”
In Britain’s last Davis Cup final they lost to the United States in 1978. Their last victory in a final was in 1936, when they beat Australia. If they defeat them again in a semi-final tie from 18 to 20 September – with an outside chance of it being held at Wimbledon but more likely back in Glasgow where they beat the United States in front of sellout crowds in the first round in March – they play either Argentina at home or Belgium away. Australia beat Kazakhstan in their quarter-final.
Great Britain’s 1981 semi-final was against Argentina, who won 5-0 – so there is a lot of history to rearrange and a lot of bargaining of logistics to manage over the next few months but at least British tennis fans have the best player they have ever had who is willing to make some more history. The reality of this quarter-final is that it was the Murray family who won it, Jamie Murray, the 2015 Wimbledon doubles finalist, hitting a peak again to partner Andy to a stirring win on Saturday.
The French captain, Arnaud Clément, gracious and measured throughout, said of the Murray boys, “It was a great weekend for both brothers and a great performance from Andy, to play three days in a row, still moving great and physically fit.”
The younger brother, not for the first time, was fighting tears on court, looking emotionally and physically spent after a successful but demanding summer. “I don’t remember too much of the match,” he admitted. “I just tried to make him work harder. I was making too many mistakes at the beginning. He’s such a difficult guy to play against, such a strange game style that the better you play, the better he plays. It wasn’t the best tennis I’ve played. I just tried to win the match and managed to turn it around. It wasn’t looking great in the second set.”
