Looking head to the final day of the tie, one on which his team must win both singles rubbers, van Herck said: “It’s a hard day tomorrow”.
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Goffin is No. 16 in the world and had not lost a set in four previous Davis Cup matches this year in leading Belgium to the final.
The Murrays have already demonstrated that their brotherly instincts extend as far as the tennis court during a mammoth Davis Cup semi-final win.
The elder Murray admitted he was slow to get going against the Belgian pairing of Steve Darcis and David Goffin. Fans went through body searches and were not allowed to take bags into the Flanders Expo venue. With the red clay glowing under the floodlights, these events turn “lawn tennis” into something approaching a blood sport.
“We’ll see how everyone is, see how the doubles has gone”.
Older brother Jamie, the seventh best doubles player in the world, struggled at times, but his nerve proved solid as he served for the match.
Belgium would carry the momentum forwards into the third set, with the Jamie serve once again broken early on.
Jamie dropped serve in the third game of the second set as the Belgians roared back. Nine-time titlist Britain last played in the final in 1978.
Both teams’ serve games took a massive beating toward the end of the third set, as the visitors dominated from the baseline in the next game to grab yet another break and set Andy Murray up to serve for the set.
In the end, it could even boil down to the very last rubber and, although captain Leon Smith was keeping his cards close to his chest last night, that is likely to be the old campaigner James Ward, as opposed to debutant Kyle Edmund, against Darcis, who yesterday denied reports of cortisone injections in his injured arm. Some communication must have passed between them because Smith then sat down and delivered some detailed instructions to the brothers, who nodded in agreement. “It was tough to manage but I stayed calm and waited for my chance”.
The decision seemed to pay off at the start of the match, however.
Andy kept up his run of not dropping his serve – one he would finish the match with – to claim the set.
Still, it soon became clear that it had been good decision to put Goffin and Darcis together, with the match much tighter than most had imagined it would be.
Should Murray complete his country’s finest hour since Fred Perry and Bunny Austin sealed victory over Australia at Wimbledon in the 1936 final, the words “Great Britain” will be inscribed on the historic trophy, but the engraver might be tempted instead to write simply “Scotland”, “Dunblane” or even “Murrays”.
The fourth set was all too easy for Goffin as he raced through it to the loss of just one game and the Belgium crowd were now fully involved in the match as the comeback was now on. But the younger Murray simply would not budge, striking his backhand service return with the accuracy of a champion archer.
After sealing victory Andy Murray paid tribute to the British fans who had made the trip to Ghent.
Great Britain is now a single win away from ending its massive Davis Cup drought.
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“I had no idea about either of the warnings because you can’t hear anything on the court”, Murray said of the raucous atmosphere produced by a sellout crowd.
