Andy Murray surged into the Wimbledon quarter-finals with an emphatic win over Australian Nick Kyrgios on Centre Court, making of light work of seeing off a big serving opponent who had been expected to cause him problems.
It was a hard fought opening set, both threatening to break at different stages but neither doing so until, 6-5 up, Murray produced two high class and contrasting backhands to move 0-40 ahead, powering a clean cross court pass with Kyrgios at the net before producing a delicate dipping shot to embarrass his opponent who was right on top of the net.
Even then the set had not been won, Kyrgios producing an ace and an unreturnable serve to get back to 30-40, but Murray took his chance at the third time of asking when, with Kyrgios poised to volley again, he managed to keep the ball low enough to induce the error.
The break came earlier in the second, Murray ignoring his opponent’s increasingly loud groans as he played his shots, to once again force him into an error at the net on break point and Kyrgios was in a strange hurry to play his shots from that point, seeming to lose concentration as the set rapidly ran away from him.
He recovered his composure to end Murray’s run of games by holding serve to love at the start of the third set.
Murray was tormenting his opponent, though, one lob as he held serve to level things up, so teasingly played that in his bid to recover Kyrgios achieved the rare feat of knocking the ball clear out of the arena.
A fourth break of serve came in the very next game and Murray was in total control, serving out to complete a highly entertaining, but far from sapping win, with an ace on his second match point to complete a 7-5, 6-1, 6-4 victory.
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