Andy Murray secured his first win at the Australian Open for five years – and he did it
in typical fashion after a five-set, four-hour epic.
The former world No1 battled past 21st seed Nikoloz Basilshvili to progress into
round two in an utterly draining contest.
The 34-year-old headed into his first-round match in fine form having reached the
final of the Sydney International last week and that purple patch continued as he
stormed into an early lead, dropping just one game in the opening set.
While Murray was on the front foot right from the off, his early lead was almost gifted
to him thanks to some early nerves from Basilashvili with the Georgian making far
too many unforced errors early on
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Basilashvili soon found his stride through and went 4-1 up in the second set after
back-to-back breaks while errors began to slip into Murray’s game, the Scot double
faulting in a crucial fifth game.
Murray then broke back but the longer rallies were still going Basilashvili’s way and
the No.21 seed leveled the match by taking the second set.
Basilashvili saved three breakpoints, two with aces, in the fifth game as some early
signs of frustration from Murray began to show but at the fourth time of asking he
got the break to take a 3-2 lead in the third set.
The Georgian would later be forced to save two set points before Murray held serve
and moved to within one set of the second round, his defence in fine working order
throughout.
A cagey fourth set should have seen Basilashvili go 5-2 up had it not been for Murray
taking advantage of his opponent’s loss in concentration to pull it back to 5-5 with
some huge serves and some punishing points.
As we reached the three-hour mark, a tie-break was needed to decide the fourth and
Basilashvili raced into a 5-1 lead. Murray saved two match points but a weak shot
into the net took them into a fifth set decider.
Murray was quick to put the disappointing tie-break behind him though, breaking at
the first time of asking and racing into a 3-0 lead with a newfound fire in his belly.
But in typical Murray fashion, this wasn’t going to be straight forward and before long
it was 4-4, Basilashvili breaking back and then holding serve as a raucous crowd
lapped up the efforts of both players on the court.
Murray needed to dig deep one final time and earned himself three match points,
Basilashvili saved two but couldn’t stop the third as the Scot let out a roar of emotion
upon reaching the second round, three years after calling time on his career following
a hip injury.
