Amongst many reasons to be excited about this year’s Wimbledon, the performance of Andy Murray at SW19 holds key interest for not just English fans but also to millions of tennis fans across the world.

Murray, who kept on participating in tournaments whenever his body allowed him, has been aiming to fare better at Wimbledon this year.

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As a perfect start to his grass-court campaign, the Brit defeated Benoit Paire in the first-round at Queen’s Club Championships. But the real challenge for Murray came in the form of Matteo Berrettini in the next round.

The Italian, who can ease past his service games on the grass with his heavy serve on grass, has only faced Murray once on the ATP tour. But Berrettini would come into the match with a lot of confidence after a decent run at the French Open.

Let’s see how the match progressed.

Berrettini used his serve to good effect and won the first set against Andy Murray

It’s tough for any athlete recovering from injury to face a top-10 opponent. While Murray did everything he could to defend the Italian’s serve, Berrettini made a lot of unreturnable serves to stamp his authority on the match.

But Murray still showed signs of class as he won a few longer rallies, deep from the baseline. Also, a couple of untimely errors from the Brit helped Berrettini get the first break of the match.

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Since earning the break, the world number nine used his first-serve variety to good effect and hit a lot of winners on the forehand. In the entire set, Berrettini hit 15 winners as compared to Murray who managed to hit just one winner.

Serving to stay in the set at 3-5 in the set, a couple of loose first serves from the Brit helped Berrettini to free his forehand and clinch the set, 6-3.

By the end of the first set, the Brit looked out of sorts as he couldn’t figure out a way to tackle the Italian’s quick service games.

Berrettini’s serve and forehand combination became too good for Murray in the second set

Serving first, Berrettini had a comfortable service game. Throughout the match, whenever he was down on serve, his first-serve always came to the rescue. Having the liberty to test his game, the Italian began to use his backhand slice in rallies and was successful in net approach shots too.

Murray lost his initial service game in the set and gave a healthy lead of 3-0 to Berrettini. The match appeared to be going away from the Brit. Even though the former world number one had half-chances on the Italian’s serve, he failed to convert them into breakpoints.

But, Murray found a way to keep fighting till the very end as he saved a couple of breakpoints on his serve at 4-1 in the set. Once again, the Brit failed to go past a rock-solid service game from the Italian as he was just a game away from reaching the quarter-finals.

Serving at 5-3 in the second set, Berrettini hit four unreturnable first serves to defeat Murray 6-3,6-3. The Italian faces Dan Evans in the quarters.

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