While a huge load of ATP top players are taking the tennis court in Acapulco, Mexico, the rest of them are at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships. The 2nd day of the main draw's matches brought up a huge upset during the earlier session having Stan Wawrinka unable to get past Damir Dzumhur from Bosnia. With Wawrinka being eliminated, the predictions regarding the 2nd half of the board are nothing but a wild guess. In the upper half, Federer did his job yesterday, so today it was Andy Murray's turn. Despite a sloppy start, the world no. 1 bounced back and clinched a spot in the next round.
Murray put in a fair amount of work
To get past Malek Jaziri (53 ATP), Murray went through a difficult road. The opening set had both players unable to secure their own service games. Murray was broken in the 3rd game but he had a speedy recovery in the next one. At 4-4, the Scot did well under on his own service so the scoreboard pressure mounted on Jaziri's shoulders. The 33-year-old Tunisian couldn't handle it and lost the next game and Murray took the set 6-4. It was all that the Scot needed. Having a one set lead, he smoothly sailed through the 2nd set. Putting the first serve in the service box made his job easier. Jaziri had no response to that and the first seed went on dominating the set.
In the end, it was 6-1 for Murray who moves forward in the tournament.
Murray will face Guillermo Garcia-Lopez
Murray is again up and running and he is set to face a Spaniard ranked 97th in the world. If he gets past this one, Murray will play against the winner between Phillip Kohlschreiber (29 ATP) and Daniil Medvedev (57 ATP) a 21-year-old Russian rising star.
To go even further, in the semis, the odds are good to have an Andy Murray vs. Roger Federer clash. Federer played a sensational match yesterday against Benoit Paire whom he defeated in a little under an hour. While Federer is playing freely, Murray has the world no. 1 burden to bear, something that has been troublesome at times over the last few months.
