Murray carries British dreams
This may be his year at Wimbledon
ANDY Murray believes his third Queen’s Club title will act as the perfect foundation to launch his latest bid to win Wimbledon. Murray hardly had time to finish celebrating Sunday’s 5-7 7-5 6-3 victory over Croatian fifth seed Marin Cilic in the final of the pre-Wimbledon warm-up event before thoughts turned to his prospects of ending Britain’s 75-year wait for a male winner of the singles title at the All England Club.
Murray, 26, arrived at Queen’s last week dogged by fears over his fitness after a lower back injury forced him to miss the French Open.
But he coped well with the gruelling demands of a rain-affected schedule, enjoying two gritty come-from-behind wins over Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and Cilic and surviving a nasty fall in the final which briefly left him clutching his groin.
All in all it was an extremely satisfying seven days for the world No 2 with Wimbledon just a week away.
“I feel good. I’m a bit tired just now. It’s been a long five days,” Murray said.
“The last couple of days were tough matches against two top grass-court players. The most important thing in the next week or so is just to make sure I keep improving the strength of my back and make sure there are no setbacks.
“And then when Wimbledon comes round it’s all about how you play.
“Anything can happen. You can lose a bit of confidence; you can gain confidence. You can pick up a niggle; you can feel 110%. You never know.”
Since losing to Nicolas Mahut in the second round at Queen’s last year, Murray has been in dominant form on grass.
He reached his first Wimbledon final, losing to Roger Federer, and returned to the All England Club a few weeks later to avenge that loss by thrashing the Swiss great for Olympic gold.
Murray finally won his first grand slam on the back of that run, lifting the US Open title on the hard courts of New York in September.
“All of the slams or the big events that I play in now, I would hope that I’d have a little bit more confidence in myself,” he said.
“You’ve got to go in there, work hard, and be prepared to go through some tough moments and find a way to deal with them. Hopefully, I can do that at Wimbledon.” – Sapa-AFP