Wimbledon 2011 Day 7: Gasquet v Murray

Murray was looking sensible in a cap as the breezes were pretty few and far between today and it would be like an oven out there on the court.




Gasquet elected to serve and from the outset he was dictating pace well – this guy is the anti-Nadal!
Andy had a comfortable service game and was still finding range.





In the next round of games, Andy was settling down and his serve was firing nicely, finishing his service game off with a huge serve out wide. We were treated to the start of some amazing rallies on Gasquet’s service game and that balletic backhand of his ripped across the court.




Although things were continuing strongly with serve, there were perhaps chances for Andy to take advantage when he took Gasquet to deuce on his serve.





Neither of the guys were giving anything away, both were very solid behind their service games until Andy was serving at 5-6. This was maybe a bit more of a nervy hold but got things to a tiebreak. He was able to edge ahead and took the TB 7-3.

Andy opened the second set with a DF but managed to settle (everyone’s nerves) by holding! In fact he had some chances again to push Gasquet for an early break, but things continued with serve quite comfortably. Again, the standard of tennis was very high and Andy was getting good and pumped with lots of positive energy coming from him.




With Gasquet serving at 3-4, a costly DF from him gave Andy break point chancesm and this time he took them to go ahead 5-3. Reechar was very trudgy and looked pretty dispirited in the final game as Andy took the second set.




Gasquet came out firing at the start of the third and it looked briefly like we might have a competition on our hands but Andy matched him swing for swing and it really was looking like the momentum was with him. He broke Gasquet twice in the next few games, and that seemed to be the downward spiral point for Gasquet. He became pretty unraveled and was throwing in DFs here and there, and UEs a-plenty.






Andy quickly found himself serving it out at 5-2 and won his game so convincingly. He topped it off with a cheeky little bow to the Royal Box – but his game play was good, some attacking play, good pick-ups and mixing up – he’s coming rightly into some form now and needs a solid performance in the quarters now.