Giving a miss to the clay-court season, Andy Murray has been gearing up for the grass courts. In the deep urge to get back his form, the former World No. 1 recently played the Surbiton Trophy in Great Britain.

Entering the ATP challenger as the top seed, Murray cruised through the initial rounds. However, his strong run came to a halt when he suffered a semifinal loss to American, Denis Kudla. Even though the 3-time Grand Slam champion had a moment of disappointment, he made sure to take the loss as learning.

How the match unfolded for Andy Murray

Going down the history lane, Surbiton Trophy might not be an ATP tour event. However, that doesn’t restrict it from having an important place in the history of the game. First played in 1998, the Trophy is the opening tournament of the three-week long grass court season of tennis.

Diving deeper, former World No. 1s Roger Federer, and Lleyton Hewitt played their first professional grass court tournament here. Walking on similar footsteps, Murray also opted to kick off his 2022 grass court season on the lush green courts of Surbiton.

Maintaining his strong form from the previous rounds, Murray kicked off the first set taking a 3-0 lead. Even though Kudla made a comeback later in the set, it was Murray who won the first set. Going neck to neck against each other, the second set went to a tiebreaker with Kudla equalizing the set score 1-1.

While the two played some high intensity tennis in the first two sets, the third set saw a sudden drop in Murray’s game. The drop not only forced Murray to struggle but also gave the win in the hands of Kudla.

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Opening up about the match, Murray said, “It’s tough to read too much into how I played. I competed pretty well for the first couple of sets, third set not as well as I would have liked.”

“It was brutal conditions for both of us today, there was not loads of amazing tennis. We were using different skills out there and trying to find ways to put the ball in difficult positions for the opponent. Denis did a better job of that today,” he further added.

Murray hopeful of a strong comeback

Andy Murray‘s struggle with his form has been a long-known story. However, even after repeated failures, the Brit has kept his hopes high. A similar sight was seen after his semifinal loss at the Surbiton Trophy. Despite the loss, Murray opted to look at the positives of the tournament and hoped to get better with every match he plays.

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“Overall it was good for me to get four matches, I would’ve liked to have won the tournament, but that wasn’t to be,” Murray said. “I just want to keep improving week on week and match on match. That’s all you can do really.”

Following the semifinal loss at the Surbiton Trophy, Murray is now looking ahead to polish his skills further. Having the aim of playing at the lush greens of Wimbledon, Murray is expected to play his first ATP tour grass event at the Queen’s Club, where he will eye his 6th title.