Murray battles back to down Troicki
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Andy Murray of Britain overcame Viktor Troicki of Serbia in five sets in the fourth round of the French Open in Paris yesterday. |
Lethargic at times and brooding at others, Andy Murray worked his way into the French Open quarterfinals by coming back to beat Victor Troicki 4-6, 4-6, 6-3, 6-2, 7-5 yesterday in a match that started a day earlier.
The three-time grand slam runner-up won the final five games of the fifth set despite injuring his right ankle in the previous round. The first four sets were played on Monday before darkness suspended the match.
Murray looked out of it in the opening two sets on Court Suzanne Lenglen, often pacing around the clay with his head low and sometimes screaming to no one in particular. But he soon started placing his shots and quickly worked his way back into the match before play was suspended.
When the match resumed yesterday, the pair held serve until Troicki broke for a 4-2 lead shortly after a ball boy interfered with play on a point won by the 15th-seeded Serb. Troicki complained, but the point was replayed and Murray eventually took a 15-0 lead.
Two games later, Troicki was serving for the match. He took a 30-0 lead, meaning he was two points from victory, when Murray rallied again and broke back.
It is the fifth time in the 24-year-old Murray's career that he has come back from two sets down to win. The fourth-seeded Briton is now 11-5 in five-set matches.
Later yesterday, Roger Federer was to face Gael Monfils for a spot in the semifinals. Also, defending women's champion Francesca Schiavone rallied past Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova of Russia.
On Monday, Robin Soderling served his way into the quarterfinals to set up a match against defending champion Rafael Nadal, who is 42-1 at Roland Garros and has won five of the past six titles.
"Everybody knows what he can do," said Soderling, the only man to defeat Nadal at the clay-court major. "He won here so many times."
The fifth-seeded Swede advanced by beating Gilles Simon of France 6-2, 6-3, 7-6 (5), while Nadal defeated Ivan Ljubicic of Croatia 7-5, 6-3, 6-3.
On the women's side, Maria Sharapova reached the quarterfinals by beating 12th-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland 7-6 (4), 7-5.
Soderling has lost the past two French Open finals, but he has also beaten the past two defending champions along the way. In 2009, he eliminated Nadal from the fourth round, ending the Spaniard's streak of four straight championships at Roland Garros.
But Soderling lost to Federer in the final in straight sets. "After that I proved to myself that I could do well in grand slams, and it helped me a lot," Soderling said.
Fast-forward one year to 2010, and nearly the same thing happened. Soderling eliminated defending champion Federer - this time in the quarterfinals - but then lost to Nadal in straight sets in the final.
Now Soderling gets another chance to knock out arguably the best player ever on clay.
"I have to be mentally ready for a really tough match. He's not going to give you anything," Soderling said.
"You have to fight. Against Rafa you have to fight for every point."
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