Andy Murray showed impressive resolve and some glimpses of his best tennis as he beat No1 seed Stefanos Tsitsipas in straight sets at the Stuttgart Open. Murray had to fight hard during a first set in which the Greek served immaculately, but the Scot forced a tie-break and then earned the only mini-break of another impressive serving trade-off.
The loss of the first set seemed to knock Tsitsipas off his stride and his first serve percentage fell away in the second, as Murray earned the first break of the match with some sublime touch around the net to lead 5-2. Tsitsipas saved two match points on his own serve but couldn’t repeat the trick in the next game as Murray closed it out with a powerful forehand down the line.
The Scot is enjoying some important grass-court preparation ahead of Wimbledon, earning his first win over a top-five ranked player since 2016, and now faces a semi-final against either Marton Fucsovics or Nick Kyrgios.
