The finals of the 2016 Australian Open men’s singles bracket are now set, with No. 2 seed Andy Murray besting No. 13 seed Milos Raonic in a thrilling five-set war, 4-6, 7-5, 6-7(4), 6-4, 6-2.
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The No. 2-seed ultimately ran away with the match, closing out the deciding set 6-2 after four hours to advance to his fifth Australian Open final and end Raonic’s undefeated season-he was coming off a title in Brisbane earlier this month and beat No. 4-seed Stan Wawrinka and Gael Monfils en route to the semifinals.
Andy Murray has defeated Milos Raonic in the semi-finals of the Australian Open to set up a final against world No. 1 Novak Djokovic.
His game dropped off markedly after the injury, showing occasional pain after points.
The 28-year-old will now head to his fifth Australian Open final having lost three to Djokovic and once to Roger Federer, aiming to win the tournament for the first time.
A match pitting one of the game’s finest servers against a returning maestro promised fireworks but few would have tipped Raonic to break his opponent to love in the opening game. “It’s unfortunate. Probably the most heartbroken I felt on court, but that’s what it is”. “You just have to focus”.
At 2-1 on serve in the fourth, Raonic called for a medical timeout for what appeared to be a lower back injury. We’ve played a bunch of times here. Kim’s father, Nigel Sears, was in Melbourne as coach for Ana Ivanovic and had to be rushed to a hospital by ambulance during one of her matches on Rod Laver Arena, which happened to coincide with Murray’s fourth-round match on an adjacent arena.
“I think maybe that’s why I sort of lashed out the way I did after the start of the fifth set”.
“I was going to fight and see what I could make of it, but it wasn’t looking that great”, said a gloomy Raonic.
Murray goes through to his ninth grand slam final, joining his brother Jamie at the last stage after his sibling made the final of the men’s doubles to be played on Saturday.
Raonic had another visit from the trainer, who massaged his right thigh, but Murray was in the groove and he served out to force a decider. Yet even in the first two sets he was unable to strike his backhand, his weaker shot, as well as he did in the quarterfinals against Gael Monfils.
“For me, my child is more important to me, and my wife is more important to me than a tennis match”. “People have asked ‘Do you think it will be a distraction?’ It might be but it’s a good distraction”, he said.
6-4 6-2 in a gruelling four-hour contest.
In the fourth set, Murray broke Raonic’s serve at love in the seventh game, saved one break point in the next game and then two in the 10th. – Jamie Murray (@jamie_murray), who is through to the doubles final, was delighted for his younger brother.
Murray has now reached his fifth final in Melbourne and he has said he hopes for a better result against Djokovic.
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The two-time Grand Slam champion will join Novak Djokovic, Serena Williams and Angelique Kerber in pursuit of the marquee title during championship weekend at Melbourne Park.
