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Murray clinches China Open title
BEIJING: Andy Murray outgunned Bulgaria’s Grigor Dimitrov 6-4, 7-6(2) in the final of the China Open on Sunday to claim his 40th career title.
BEIJING: Andy Murray outgunned Bulgaria’s Grigor Dimitrov 6-4, 7-6(2) in the final of the China Open on Sunday to claim his 40th career title.
Murray closed out the match in an hour and 57 minutes to draw closer in the rankings to world No 1 Novak Djokovic in the battle for the year-end top spot.
The Briton is now 1555 points behind Djokovic, who could not defend his title in China because of an elbow problem, with plenty of points up for grabs at the remaining events of the season in Shanghai, Paris and the Tour finals in London.
Murray took the first set, despite winning just 30 percent of first-serve points, and looked set to serve out the second when leading 5-4 before Dimitrov fought back to force a tiebreak.
The Scot, who did not drop a set in Beijing, earned an immediate mini-break and went on to win his fifth title of the season.
“It’s been the most consistent year of my career, getting to the latter stages of most of the events I have played,” Murray told Sky Sports after the win.
“Today’s match was a very high-level match. Grigor fought right to the end and made it extremely tough to finish it in two sets. I’m very happy with the way that I have played the last couple of matches. I will look forward to Shanghai now.”
Murray has had a busy European summer, having reached the French Open final, secured a second Wimbledon triumph, and then successfully defended his Olympic gold medal in Rio.
He is scheduled to play next in the Shanghai Masters this month where he has a first-round bye. His first match will be against either Steve Johnson or Martin Klizan.
