 | ||
Andy Murray made sure of a place at the ATP World Tour Finals after reaching the last eight of the Shanghai Masters.
The world number four cruised to a 6-3 6-4 victory over Frenchman Jeremy Chardy in Shanghai and will now take on Jo-Wilfried Tsonga or Florian Mayer.
The victory guarantees his place in November's season-ending World Tour Finals, which takes place in London.
"It was a big match because I knew if I won I qualified for London," said Murray. "I was a little bit nervous."
Murray, who seems to have recovered from the illness which hampered him at the China Open last week, was never really threatened by a player he had beaten in their previous two meetings.
And he was helped by an erratic performance from the 23-year-old Frenchman, whose error-strewn display prevented him pushing Murray on a consistent basis.
The match was first on the day's schedule in Shanghai and Murray had a stuttering start, losing the first three points on serve as Chardy, the world number 59, carved out three break points.
But Murray battled back to hold serve and then secured a break in the next game to take an early advantage in the opening set.
Chardy did have break points in the fifth and seventh games but failed to take them as Murray served out to take a one set lead.
Murray had two break points in the third game of the second set and although he did not take them, the decisive point came in game seven.
Chardy managed to save two break points but then double-faulted on the third, his first of the match, as Murray took a 4-3 lead.
The end was soon coming and Murray was able to comfortably seal victory in one hour and 21 minutes.
The match was watched by a sparse crowd in Shanghai but the 23-year-old insisted it was not a problem, saying: "It's not necessarily a lack of motivation, it's just a question of bringing some energy into the match.
"I feel like when I am sweating a lot I am in a match and it's incredibly humid in here so it wasn't actually a problem today."
0 comments:
Post a Comment