TMS Toronto: Murray v Ferrer

Madeline · Admin:Moderator + Tennis Legend

RE: TMS Toronto: Murray v Ferrer

Sheddie · administrator

Wow, great win. I would have preferred Andy to have finished it 30 min ago but a win's a win.

Hopefully a certain lady up in frozen Tyneside won't be suffering too much from heart trouble tomorrow morning, lol

Sheddie · administrator

Great commentary Niall, thanks for the match info. What a tiebreak, especially the point at 5-6 when Ferrer had set point. Must have been really nerve-racking watching that one.

This win shows what a fantastic gritty fighter Andy is. After losing a 5-0 lead, so many players would have got despondent and gone on to lose set and match but not Andy.

Back when he was playing futures and challengers, that kind of gritty, never-say-die attitude won him so many close matches often coming back from losing the 1st set 6-1, or 6-2 to win in 3.

Niall · Pro player

Too be honest I never tought Andy was playing well enough to thrash the 13th best player in the world. I guess you could call that 'winning ugly'.

Andy was lucky that Ferrer threw in several genuine unforced errors in the tiebreak as he was making errors himself and it was all getting a bit tense. To be fair Ferrer had hardly hit an error for 6 games so you might say he was due a couple.

Well done Andy for holding it together because he fell appart just two days ago in a similar situation. In the end he did just enough.

-- Edited by Niall at 01:23, 2006-08-09

yesyesbadboy · Lower Club Player

yeh well, i think if it went to a 3rd

ferrer would of taken it, great example of baseline clay court hitters battling it out, shows u why murray is calss for a brti tennis player, he can slug it out from the back unlike henman, who would of lost badly there.

ferrer was class though near the end but well done andy, i think brad will be after him thoiugh after teh lapse or u could say ferrer's comeback

aria81 · Club Coach

As soon as Andy gets himself a serve he will be immense - unfortunately until that happens we'll have some more nervous matches like that. That was a good match to win - obviously it was ugly at the end but being able to grit it out like that will be good for him. Also, if he had won that second set at a canter it might have given him a bit too much confidence about his chances this week. That lapse probably gave him the wee boot up the backside he needed, but also gave him a positive to work with. Lets face it - any win over a guy of Ferrer's class is a good win.

yesyesbadboy · Lower Club Player

yeh obviously ferre was crap, but when he did play boy he's good. We need a ruthless attitude, thats the problem with england and britian and ireland, no ruthless attitude. it is a let down, gilbert needs to install this and he will by god he will. no more oh he can have a game or a point just pure no mercy . An d with a serve which is looking good already, gilbert seems to have shown him a new serve where he throws it further behind his head. have u noticed anywayt good one murray son

kundalini · Specialist Reporter + Intermediate Club Player

On the plus side Andy struck his first serve with real power, seven aces and plenty of unreturned serves, though at key moments in the match such as when serving for the match and then again in the tiebreak, his rhythm went and he was perhaps fortunate to get home in the tiebreak.

As for the match it was aggressive Ferrer against passive Murray. At 6-2 5-0 Ferrer's unforced errors appeared to have gifted Andy the match without him having to anything more than keep the ball in play long enough for Ferrer to self-destruct; though to Andy's credit he did vary the pace and the spin in the hope of inducing a mistake. Very few winners from Andy even when he was so dominant on the scoreboard and this negative approach started to become a problem once Ferrer found his range and began to strike huge forehands for outright winners, and come into the net to put away easy volleys. Even when Murray reached match point as he did on three separate occasions prior to the tiebreak, it was down to Ferrer's errors and each time Ferrer's aggressive play saved him.

Overall a poor match from both players. Ferrer's error count was astonishing and Murray's passive play and poor first serve percentage, deeply alarming. The aggression on the first groundstroke that he showed against Tursunov was missing and had the match gone to a third set Ferrer was the likely winner. Andy's performance was perhaps slightly better than in the Clement match but nowhere near the level he achieved against Tursunov. Brad's post-match assessment will have been brutal.