MELBOURNE, (Reuters) – Andy Murray went through paroxysms of frustration but seized another opportunity to break his Australian Open jinx with a four-hour, five-set semi-final victory over Milos Raonic yesterday.
Four times the British world number two has advanced to the final at Melbourne Park and four times he has been vanquished, three times at the hands of Novak Djokovic.
The Serbian will again stand in his path on tomorrow as the Scot seeks to add another grand slam title to his 2012 U.S. Open and 2013 Wimbledon crowns.
“Five finals is a great achievement,” said Murray. “You can’t take that away from me.
“I should be happy about that. There’s very few players that will have made five Australian Open finals, so I have to be proud of that achievement.”
Raonic, meanwhile, was left heartbroken after suffering a thigh injury that hampered him from the middle of the third set of the 4-6 7-5 6-7(4) 6-4 6-2 defeat.
Winning tennis matches never looks like a walk in the park for Murray but for much of the contest against the Canadian, he at least had some justification for the tortured grimaces and explosions of anger that followed every setback.
The 13th seed has been on fire this year and his big serve and huge forehands had one of the best returners in the game on the ropes, while his new-found net game helped him to a healthy 72 winners.
Murray said earlier this week that he would waste no more energy on the histrionics but the match was just minutes old when he returned to his chair muttering curses having been broken to love in his first service game. That was to be Raonic’s only break of the match but it was enough to win the first set and, after Murray had pounced to even up the contest, he ramped up his 230 kilometre-per-hour serve to clinch the third on tiebreak.s
