| Wednesday, 2 July 2008 Written by Ronald Atkin British warrior Andy Murray's eagerly-anticipated quarter-final battle with Rafael Nadal turned into a one-sided 6-3 6-2 6-4 victory for the number two seed from Spain, who showed he is in the form to march on to a first Wimbledon title.
Murray, who had thrilled his supporters with the bravery of his comeback against Richard Gasquet in the fourth round on Monday evening, was never in with a chance against Nadal, who opened strongly and escalated his level of performance to an unstoppable level.
The man from Mallorca was completely dominant on serve, conceding only a handful of points and demolishing Murray's faint hope of making a decent match of it by attacking Murray's serve so effectively that a Centre Court crowd willing the home hero to win was reduced to near-silence.
The match had been turned into another evening occasion by the rain delays earlier in the day and the setting sun caused problems to both players on serve. But Murray was promptly suffering far more serious trouble as he ran into an opponent at the very peak of his powerful, dominating game.
Though Murray managed to stay at level-pegging for the first six games in the opening set, the way the match was going became glaringly obvious. Nadal conceded one point in his first three service games, while Murray did well to fight off two break points at 2-3.
But the home resistance could not last and Murray was partly responsible for his own demise in that first set, attempting a drop shot which was woefully short and dropping serve when he put a smash yards over the Spaniard's baseline to go 5-3 down.
Still the incredible winners flowed from Nadal, stretching Murray to the limit, and when he arrived at set point he showed how a smash should be put away to take the set in 35 minutes, having dropped a miserly four points on his serve.
Hopes that Murray might be able to stem the Nadal tide lasted only until the third game of the second set when Nadal broke the Scot to love, helped by another weak Murray double-fault. The Scot was now virtually in free fall, narrowly holding serve at 2-3 with the help of his third ace, but there was to be no escape the next time he stepped up to the service line, Nadal broke him to love with more scorching ground strokes.
Not having conceded a single point on serve so far, Nadal showed he is human by dropping two points, one on his first double-fault, as he served out to go two sets up with the match only 68 minutes old.
Murray dug deep to stay in the fight in the third set, benefitting from the occasional Nadal error. But he still could not make the slightest impression on the Nadal serve, the key to this match.
Nadal continued to hold with ease, while edging closer and closer to the decisive break of serve which would clinch the third set, and a place in the semi-final. It came in the seventh game as Murray, increasingly desperate, was the architect of his own downfall with a wild forehand into the net to go 3-4 behind.
Nadal moved to match point with another thunderous smash and Murray obliged the Spaniard by driving a forehand well over the baseline. A great win for Nadal, a lesson hopefully learned by Murray.
| Centre Court - Gentlemen's Singles - Quarterfinals | |
|
|
Match Statistics
