Battling Norrie keeps Scots hopes alive

The Scots could celebrate an early victory for one of their own – but not the usual fellow. Cameron Norrie, whose father was born in Glasgow, needed only 94 minutes to score his first grand-slam win out on the boondocks of Court 14.

“I’m pretty Scottish, I think,” said Norrie – even though he has only visited the country a handful of times. He was born 22 years ago in Johannesburg to a pair of microbiologists whose scientific expertise has given them the freedom of the globe. At the age of three, the Norries moved to New Zealand. “My parents were sick of getting robbed, little things like that,” he said. “New Zealand was just a really safe country.”

Talented Norrie spent his early years starring more on the cricket pitch in Auckland than the tennis court. Had he not loathed standing around in the field, he might have been playing in the Natwest T20 blast this week, rather than at the US Open.

Instead, he came to Great Britain as a teenager to train at the National Tennis Centre, and then put in three years at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth. Last week, he came though qualifying here in fine style, winning all six sets that he played, and will now move into the top 200 for the first time.

A first-round meeting with Dmitry Tursunov was a favourable draw, given that Tursunov is 34 and stands at No645 in the world, only gaining entry to this tournament via a protected ranking.

Tursunov had a set point to win the first set in the tie-break, but could not take it and then became quickly demoralised, perhaps knowing that he was not in shape to go deep. He lost six straight games to fall 7-6, 6-1 behind before calling the match off.