Jamie just fails to get in the mix
NO MURRAY TITLE JOY IN ANDY’S ABSENCE
AWimbledon fortnight that began with disappointment for one murray brother ended in defeat for another.
defending champion Jamie murray and partner Victoria Azarenka lost 7-6, 6-3 to no 11 seeds Alexander Peya and nicole melichar in the mixed doubles final last night in the last match of the 2018 Championships.
After Andy murray pulled out on the eve of the tournament, Jamie has been flying the family flag alone this fortnight. by making this final the Scot ensured it would be the seventh year out of the last eight in which a murray has featured in the last weekend of Wimbledon.
After victories last year with martina Hingis and in 2007 with Jelena Jankovic, 32-year-old murray was trying to become the second man in history, after indian wizard leander Paes, to win a third Wimbledon mixed doubles title with a third different partner.
but instead of a sixth doubles Grand Slam for murray, it was a first both for 24-year- old melichar and 38-year- old Peya, who finally earned a major after 20 years on the tour.
‘Wimbledon was always a cornerstone to me, so to be sitting here as a champion is amazing,’ said Peya.
The Austrian veteran and his American partner looked sharper, faster and more in tune than murray and Azarenka. murray admitted he was under par and left his partner exposed.
‘i didn’t return well enough,’ he said. ‘i didn’t give Vika any chances to put pressure on them. i didn’t feel like i served that good either, to be honest. i was disappointed at my performance.’
murray, who lost in the quarter-finals of the men’s doubles, had been intending to skip the mixed this year but when he heard Azarenka was looking for a partner he felt it was an opportunity he could not miss.
Azarenka’s career has stalled after she gave birth to her first child in december 2016 and this event has given her a useful run of matches. She said she would be keen to play with murray again, possibly at the US open next month.
Azarenka and murray had to battle hard even to get this far, coming back to win from 5-1 down in the deciding set of their second-round match.
if they had ridden their luck then, it ran out yesterday. murray had a nightmare in the first-set tiebreak, fluffing a straightforward volley on the first point and double faulting on the last. Peya and melichar took it 7-1.
Having not had a break point in the first set, murray and Azarenka earned three on the Peya serve in the first game of the second but the chances came and went. As his partner clung on to her serve, murray could not do the same and, when he was broken from 40-15 up, the writing was on the wall. Azarenka blasted away from the back, murray flung himself about at the net but it was all in vain.