Andy Murray remained on a package before his round of 16 in Toronto. He didn’t show up in Cincinnati either, the fault of an abdominal strain. The 36-year-old Scot’s first round against Corentin Moutet was expected. It went well for the 37th in the world, who won in three sets (6-2, 7-5, 6-3) on Tuesday for his debut at Flushing Meadows.
The ex-world number 1 seemed to have very good feelings and was hard-hitting, especially in the forehand to hit the one-handed backhand slice of the Parisian left-hander, who fired several superb covered backhand passings.
Murray, 200th Grand Slam victory
Murray dominated the first set, where he accelerated to 2-2. Broken at 2-2 in the second set by Moutet, Ivan Lendl’s protege was not far from losing it, the Frenchman (72nd) getting two set points on his serve. But Murray ended up unbreaking on a winning backhand, which prompted the Francilien to smash his racket, before the Briton closed the set 7-5.
Moutet experienced a small physical alert at the start of the third set, following a fall. His left ankle began to twist on a support after a forehand strike, the player fell and landed badly on the left wrist. He rolled on the ground for a moment, holding his wrist, before resuming the game.
The winner of the 2012 US Open had to wait for his 10th opportunity to break his opponent at 4-3 in the third set and validated his qualification on his fourth opportunity (after saving a ball from 5-5) on a high volley backhand in a game where VAR was used for the first time, without success. Murray signs his 200th Grand Slam victory: 51 at the Australian Open, 39 at Roland-Garros, 61 at Wimbledon and 49 at the US Open.
The Briton has an appointment with the Bulgarian Grigor Dimitrov (19th), overthrowing winner of the Slovak Alex Molcan (6-7, 6-7, 6-1, 7-5, 7-6) in the second round.
