Andy Murray hopes his victory over Novak Djokovic in Montreal can provide a timely confidence boost ahead of the US Open.
The Scot, who has now moved up to second place in the world rankings, secured a 6-4 4-6 6-3 win in three hours to lift the Rogers Cup and end an eight-match losing run against the Serb.
Murray’s last victory over Djokovic came in the 2013 Wimbledon final and there had been suggestions the world number one’s dominance in recent meetings had resulted in some kind of psychological barrier that Murray needed to overcome.
The two-time Grand Slam champion insists that was not the case, but he admits his victory in Montreal may have come at just the right time ahead of the final Grand Slam of the year, the US Open, which begins at the end of the month.
“I don’t give as much thought to that as everyone else,” Murray told the Tennis Podcast as reported by The Telegraph.
“Last year I didn’t beat any of the top players, my game wasn’t there, physically I wasn’t quite there yet having come back from the back surgery. But the matches that we’ve played this year, I had some opportunities and felt like I was playing well enough to win.
“But Novak is an incredibly difficult guy to beat so it’s no disgrace in losing to him. But it’s nice any time you beat the number one player in the world. To beat someone as good as Novak is good for the confidence and hopefully I can use that to my advantage in the next couple of weeks.”
Murray had suffered four defeats to Djokovic in 2015 prior to his win in Montreal – the finals of the Australian Open and Miami Masters and in the semi-finals of the French Open and Indian Wells.
Murray is 4.33 to win the US Open outright, Djokovic can be backed at 2.10 and Stan Wawrinka is 13.00.
Leave a comment
Link Dafabet