MURRAY IS READY FOR THE U.S. OPEN

ANDY MURRAY believes he has beaten his injury problems and is ready to take his place in the US Open. The 30-year-old, who has not played a match since losing his quarter-final at Wimbledon, was on a plane to New York last night in preparation. Doubts had emerged over his fitness to contest the year’s final Grand Slam after he pulled out of Masters events in Montreal and Cincinnati. But those withdrawals were part of a policy to combine carefully planned rest with intensive treatment on the hip injury he carried through Wimbledon. The noises coming from the Murray camp yesterday suggested they are now happy with his condition. Murray will be No 2 seed at Flushing Meadow after losing his world No 1 ranking to Rafa Nadal during his time out. But after starting practice this week, he will step up his work in New York believing he has a big chance to claim the prize that was his first major title back in 2012. Since then he has never got beyond the quarter-finals, but with all the game’s major stars apart from Nadal facing unprecedented injury issues, there is a big opportunity. Novak Djokovic and Stan Wawrinka are already out, and Roger Federer withdrew from Cincinnati this week as a precaution. World No 10 Milos Raonic and Wimbledon finalist Marin Cilic are also dealing with injuries. Meanwhile, Britain’s Johanna Konta won a hard-hitting contest as she beat Slovakian Dominika Cibulkova 6-3, 6-4 to reach the Cincinnati Open quarter-finals, setting up a rematch of her Wimbledon quarter-final against Simona Halep.