Andy Murray led Britain to a first Davis Cup success in 79 years nine months ago and has always taken great pride from playing for his country.
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The Argentinian, the champion at Flushing Meadows in 2009, is ranked down at 141 as he battles his way back from a left wrist problem that required three operations. On the other side, del Potro, who made a fabulous run in Rio, had a hard task against Rafael Nadal.
Murray ended with 10 aces and 46 crunching winners while del Potro smashed 39 winners but was undone by 57 unforced errors.
Del Potro had previously won the bronze at the 2012 London Olympics, having been ousted by Federer on that occasion, the final set ending 19-17 in favour of the Swiss master. The Spaniard, seeded third in the singles, also played the doubles and won the gold along with countryman Marc Lopez, outlasting Florin Mergea and Horia Tecau of Romania.
Rio de Janeiro (dpa) – When Andy Murray took to the Olympic tennis court in Rio on Sunday, the odds were stacked well in his favour.
He has had a great year so far, reaching the finals of both Australian Open and French Open before winning the Wimbledon.
“Carrying the flag was an fantastic experience and I found it quite emotional”, said Murray.
The fourth set was a match in itself, with Murray three times coming from a break down after Del Potro had gone from the verge of total exhaustion to looking like he might force a decider.
“It means a lot”.
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“The day after I had to regroup and get my mind on the matches so to finish it with a match like that was very emotional too”. Emotionally it was tough, physically it was hard with so many ups and downs in the match. He’s had a very good run in the last two Challengers that he’s played, advancing to the final in Lexington and winning his first Challenger title in Granby, which brought him his career-best ranking. Venus won her fifth medal, a silver, in mixed doubles (with Rajeev Ram) Sunday – she’s now tied for the most medals in Olympics tennis overall. As with McDonald, Michael will play his maiden Grand Slam event in NY and will get a chance to not only collect some nice experience on the biggest tennis stage, but to also fight for his first ATP win. Then, Murray got the strings of the match and the fragile balance was disrupted.
