Murray puts on a show for the Queen

LONDON: British fourth-seed Andy Murray gave a royal command performance as he raced into the third round at Wimbledon with a 6-3, 6-4, 6-2 win over Finland’s Jarkko Nieminen in front of Queen Elizabeth II.

After acknowledging the monarch who was on her first visit to the All England Club since 1977 with a brief bow to the royal box, Murray got down to business.

Nieminen had four break points but was unable to take any of them as Murray got out of trouble. The Scot was dominant from then on, and then finally crushed Nieminen in the third set as Murray unfurled winner after winner.

Swedish sixth seed Robin Soderling advanced to the third round at Wimbledon with a 7-5, 6-1, 6-4 win over Spain’s Marcel Granollers and Danish third seed Caroline Wozniacki claimed  a 6-4, 6-3 victory against Taiwan’s Chang Kai-Chen.

The Swiss stumbles through

Defending champion Roger Federer squeezed into the third round on Wednesday with a 6-3, 6-7 (4/7), 6-4, 7-6 (7/5) win over qualifier Ilija Bozoljac. Federer missed two early break points but was then gifted another which he seized in the seventh game for a 4-3 lead. Soon after, his game began to wilt courtesy of Bozoljac’s deadly big serving but managed a narrow escape in the end when forced an error from the Serbian on match-point that finally sealed an unconvincing win.

Third-seed Novak Djokovic managed to put together a better performance as he moved into the third round with a 7-6 (7/5), 6-1, 6-4 win against qualifier Taylor Dent, along with the Russian Maria Sharapova beat Ioana Raluca Olaru 6-1, 6-4.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 25^th, 2010.