Edet Ikotidem
After eventually falling to Spain’s Roberto Bautista Agut in a valiant performance in which he found it difficult to move, Andy Murray is eliminated from the Australian Open.
Former world number one Murray completed his second-round match at 4 am on Friday and was defeated 6-1 6-7 (7-9) 6-3 6-4 when he returned to the court 39 hours later.
The final British defeat in the singles came from a 35-year-old Scot who underwent potentially career-ending hip surgery in 2019.
Dan Evans was defeated by fifth seed Andrey Rublev earlier on Saturday, losing 6-4 6-2 6-3.
In what the three-time Grand Slam champion feared would be his final match, Murray gave it everything he had on the court before losing to the man who famously defeated him at the 2019 Australian Open.
Two weeks later, Murray underwent hip resurfacing surgery, which he initially believed would prevent him from being able to play tennis again. But four years later, Murray was back in Melbourne and attempting to advance to the fourth round of a major tournament for the first time since Wimbledon in 2017.
Andy Murray Eliminated
Following his loss to Bautista Agut, 34, Murray admitted that he was “feeling a lot of mixed emotions.”.
How would Murray physically recover to face the 24th seed Bautista Agut after defeating Australia’s Thanasi Kokkinakis in a five-set thriller that Murray called a “farce”?
The longest match of Murray’s eventful career took him five hours and 45 minutes to defeat Kokkinakis, who was ranked 66th in the world.
After needing almost five hours to defeat Italian 13th seed Matteo Berrettini in the opening round, that was already an extraordinary effort—especially for an older player with a lump of metal in his hip.
From the beginning, there were warning signs that things would not go well.
The five-time finalist frequently winced after points and walked gingerly between them, appearing to be in pain as Bautista Agut won the first set in just 29 minutes.
The night appeared to be over when the Spaniard, a reliable counterpuncher, moved a break up in the second set.
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However, Murray steadfastly refused to concede defeat, as he frequently has in the past.
The British number four began to move a little more freely, at least during the points and fought back to send the set into a tie-break.
He needed his fighting spirit there once more. Murray was down 5-2 but, with the crowd behind him, he managed to stop Bautista Agut’s first two set points before tying the match with his second set point.
A close third set remained on serve until Murray finally gave up to assist Bautista Agut break in the eighth game, during which he continued to hit some incredible shots but hunched over in pain between points.
In the fourth set, Murray broke despite having trouble holding his serve for a 2-0 advantage, but Bautista Agut persevered and broke for 5-4 before serving out the match.
Murray received a thunderous standing ovation as he trudged off the court, and the mild-mannered Bautista Agut excitedly celebrated to show how far he had to go to defeat the brave Murray.
