Andy Murray Out, But Credit Must Go To Andy Roddick

So the Wimbledon dream is over for another year, and the wait for a British champion continues. The widespread opinion seems to be that Murray disappointed in the semi final, and indeed that it was only due to the luck of the draw that he even made it as far as he did.

But such opinions are groundless, and there can be little doubt that Murray will lift not just one, but several grand slam titles.

To begin with, to say that he had easy opponents and that Roddick was his first real test, as the majority of opinions on sky sports debate argue, is ridiculous.

For naturally Murray will play opponents ranked below him until the latter stages of a major tournament, since he is ranked number three in the whole world. That is surely the whole point of seeding.

It is hardly as though such a position in the rankings is undeserved. Murray has been to the final of a grand slam within the last year, has won the Miami masters, commonly known as the “fifth” major, as well as the Abu Dhabi world championship.

Furthermore, Stanislas Wawrinka was undoubtedly a serious test, and Juan Carlos Ferrero had beaten two highly ranked players, Gonzalez and Simon, to even reach Murray in the draw.

It was only due to Murray’s awesome performance that he was made to look so average in that match. If people expect Murray to be drawn against the likes of Federer in the second round, they can expect to be forever disappointed.

As for the semi final itself, some of the disappointment felt is understandable. Murray was after all, favourite for the match, is ranked above Roddick, and had a very favourable head to head record.

However, throughout the tournament, there was an assumption that Murray would make the final, purely based on rankings, and people forgot, as Boris Becker wrote in the Telegraph, that “Roddick knows a thing or two about playing on grass”.

The stats from the match do not lie. Murray served more aces, hit more winners and made fewer unforced errors than Roddick, but the American’s serve was simply colossal. As Murray himself said, with total justification, if someone serves at over 130 mph over 75% of the time, it is extremely difficult to break him.

In light of this, Murray did tremendously well to take the third and fourth sets to tiebreaks, especially in the third, where he showed tremendous heart to break back when Roddick was serving for the set at 5-4.

In the end, the match came down to one or two points in those tiebreaks, and had Murray taken his set point at 6-5 in the third set tiebreak, it could all have been very different.

It is true that Murray was perhaps a little too passive on that particular point, given that he had a look at a second serve, but Roddick’s volley winner was a total mis-hit, so in reality Murray probably deserved to win the point, and with it the set.

Roddick was inspired, serving and volleying brilliantly. His groundstrokes were also models of controlled aggression; the unforced errors we have come to expect were nowhere to be seen.

It is the best he has played on grass since 2004, and it was no disgrace that Murray was defeated by such a superb performance, especially since he was but a few points from winning.

The public, and some sports writers, have failed to appreciate how well the Scot played, not just in the previous rounds, but the semi final itself. After all, the world number 5, Del Potro, went out to Hewitt in the second round.

On paper, this was a huge shock, but Hewitt was similarly revitalised. Of course, there can be no denying that this was a big chance gone begging for Murray to end British semi final woe, but this was still a huge improvement on last year, and at 22, he is only going to get better.