Stellar ‘Serandy’ storm into next round with incisive display

Andy Murray and Serena Williams booked their place in the last 16 of the mixed doubles at Wimbledon with a 7-5, 6-3 win over 14th seeds Fabrice Martin and Raquel Atawo. The pair will now play top seeds Bruno Soares – the former men’s partner of Murray’s brother Jamie – and Nicole Melichar.

Andy Murray has all but ruled himself out of a return to singles at next month’s US Open, saying he needs more time to fight his way back to full competitive sharpness after his hip operation.

The Scot’s rehab continued on its winning way at Wimbledon last night as he progressed into the third round of the mixed doubles alongside Serena Williams – but after the 7-5, 6-3 victory over Williams’ US compatriot Raquel Atawo and Fabrice Martin of France he said the next Slam at Flushing Meadows would probably come too soon.

“I think it’s pretty unlikely I’ll play,” Murray said. “I talked to my team a bit about this yesterday. There’s just a lot of stuff to get done physically so I’m stronger.

“The amount of work I need to do on the court to get ready for singles, the amount of work I need to put in off the court to be strong enough to play bestof-five sets – that’s still quite a ways away, unfortunately.

“I would love to play but I need to look, like, pretty long-term with this. I don’t want to be having to go through another big operation in a few years’ time. I want to make sure the operation I’ve had lasts for as long as possible. To give

it the best chance, I need to make sure that I’m physically really strong.”

Murray was asked if this meant he was targeting the Australian Open at the start of next year. “I don’t know exactly. You guys want a timeframe but I can’t give you an exact one.

“I think what I’ve done this grasscourt season has been a positive thing. Some people might like [full recovery] to have taken five or six months but it’s going to be more than that. Whether that’s nine, 12 or 18 months,

“I don’t know. I’ll do my best to make it as soon as I can.”

However, pursuing doubles at the expense of getting ready for singles is not something he is ready to do. “I want to try to prepare and get ready for singles,” he said. “If I’m able to train the way that I need to off the court and still maintain kind of, I guess, my performance on it in doubles, I would consider that.

“But I don’t know if I want to go over to the States to play doubles for four or five weeks. I’m not sure yet.

“I’ll decide on that probably when the tournament’s done and sit down with my team.”