History beckons again for Murray
TENNIS
GOLD rather than history will be on Andy Murray’s mind when he plays in a second successive Olympic men’s singles final against Juan Martin del Potro today. The world No 2 is the first man to achieve the feat and, should he retain the title he won so gloriously in 2012, he would become the first tennis player to win back to back singles golds.
In an era dominated by three all-time greats, to accomplish something Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic have not done first, and probably never will, would be a huge feather in Murray’s cap.
“The goal is to just try to win a gold medal,” he said. “I’m not really thinking about any of the stuff that goes with that just now.
“It’s obviously a very difficult thing to do, hence why it’s not been done before. I’ll go out there, hopefully play a good match, fight as hard as I can, give it everything and see what happens.”
If Murray can find the same form he showed in a 6-1, 6-4 demolition of fourth seed Kei Nishikori then he will be tough to beat.
The 29-year-old knew he needed to step things up after surviving tight, tense tussles against Fabio Fognini and Steve Johnson and he did just that. Murray served superbly and dominated off the ground, with Nishikori failing to create a break point during the match. The Scot said: “I served very well and I had no lulls in the match. I made most of the games really tough for him.
“I knew after yesterday, both of us had long matches. His singles was physically probably tougher than mine but I also had to play mixed [doubles]. I knew if I could get off to a good start, make it physically tough for him after that then it would be hard and that’s what happened.”
The one big disappointment was the crowd, with the stadium half full at best by the end. But they were all on their feet after a the remarkable penultimate point, which ended with Murray sitting on his backside with arm aloft after somehow conjuring a winning passing shot.
He said: “I just came up with a bit of a lucky shot down the line. I didn’t even see it bounce so I didn’t know whether it was in or not. Thankfully it was good.
“I was obviously pumped because if he turns that around and potentially breaks it’s a totally different match. It was a huge point.”
Murray, whose opponent today beat Nadal, added: “The last four months definitely have been the best period of my career. My job is to try to keep that going now and keep up the consistency I’ve had.
“After carrying the flag here, I didn’t want to go and bomb out in the first round. I’m glad I was able to win a medal and to win gold would cap off a special 10 days.”