Nadal had of course followed up on his Beijing Olympics singles gold with the doubles gold here with his best friend Marc Lopez. “It hasn’t been done before shows it’s very hard, so I’m very proud to have done that”. “I have played in the finals of all the Slams this year and I want to have a good one this year in NY”. “I’ve gone through some tough times on court”. I suffered when I could not play and today tennis made me happy again.
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A 2009 US Open champion and London 2012 bronze medallist, Del Potro’s silver medal signifies his continued return to form, with his past three seasons disrupted by a wrist injury.
When del Potro dumped a backhand into the net to end the match, the opponents met at the net and hugged.
Beating the Scot has become an increasingly hard thing to do. Eccleshare wrote: “How far-fetched that would have seemed when Djokovic swatted Murray aside to lift the French Open in June and claim his fourth straight major”. In the 4th set del Potro put up a decent resistance making Murray push himself to the edge in order to secure the gold.
Olympic glory has been recognised with a place in the US Open draw for Juan Martin del Potro and Bethanie Mattek-Sands.
It stood up remarkably well but Murray prodded and probed and eventually broke him down, after four hours and two minutes of brutal, sometimes brilliant tennis.
By the 10th point of the match, a 26-stroke exchange that ended with Murray netting a forehand, del Potro already looked spent.
“It means a lot”.
He had begun the Games by carrying the flag at the opening ceremony and now here he was watching it being hoisted in his honour. “I found that quite emotional”.
“To finish it with a match like that, it was obviously very emotional”, a visibly exhausted Murray told reporters. “I had to fight unbelievably hard tonight to get it”.
Then, with a grand slam title still tantalisingly elusive, he reached out to a former great in Ivan Lendl, who had stood in Murray’s shoes and helped him take the final step, winning Olympic gold and then the US Open and Wimbledon. “The US Open is the next big goal, I’ve played in all the Grand Slam finals [this year] and I will try and have a good run there”. Although Rafa lost the bronze medal match to Nishikori, he became only the second man after Nicolas Massu of Chile to win gold in the singles and the doubles events at the Olympics.
And a yay from del Potro.
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Murray will attempt for a third Cincinnati Masters title this week, but the Scot admitted his next big goal is a victory at the US Open, hoping to cap off an fantastic season in winning fashion.
