Andy Murray was unable to hide his crushing disappointment after his painful second-round loss to Stefanos Tsitsipas at Wimbledon and could not guarantee he will play again in the tournament.
After leading by two sets to one in a match postponed on Thursday night due to Wimbledon’s 11pm curfew, Murray conceded the final two sets on Friday to Tsitsipas, the fifth seed, losing 7-6 (3), 6-7 (2), 4-6, 7-6 (3), 6-4.
“Ultimately this was an opportunity for me,” said Murray. “I had a good chance of having a proper run for the first time in a long time at a slam. I didn’t take it. Regardless of the atmosphere and those things, it’s still very, very disappointing to be sitting here right now.”
Murray said he had no immediate plans to retire but could not be certain about his future. Asked how confident he is that he will return next year, Murray said: “I don’t know. Motivation is obviously a big thing. Continuing having early losses in tournaments like this doesn’t necessarily help with that. Yeah, it’s similar to I guess last year. I had a long think about things, spoke to my family, decided to keep on going. I don’t plan to stop right now. But, yeah, this one will take a little while to get over. Hopefully I find the motivation again to keep training, keep pushing, try and keep getting better.
“Obviously, you never know how many opportunities you’re going to get to play here. The defeats maybe feel a bit tougher.”
As Murray was defeated, the remaining British male players in the Wimbledon draw all fell around the same time. As Cameron Norrie, the 11th seed, lost 6-3, 3-6, 6-2, 7-6 (3) to Christopher Eubanks, Liam Broady’s run came to an end with a 4-6, 6-2, 7-5, 7-5 defeat to the 26th seed Denis Shapovalov.
Murray played an excellent match to take the two sets to one lead before returning on Friday. He eventually led 15-30 on Tsitsipas’ serve at 4-4, striking a sharp, angled backhand return that was called out. Murray did not challenge the call, but Hawk-Eye later revealed that the ball had been in. Afterwards, Murray said that although he likes the presence of linespeople on the court, he supports live electronic line calling to avoid errant calls. “I assumed the umpire would have made the right call,” said Murray. “The linesperson I think called it out. The umpire called it out. So, yeah, you can obviously argue it’s a mistake on my part. Ultimately the umpire made a poor call that’s right in front of her.”
During his post-match press conference, which was conducted minutes after his defeat, the 36-year-old appeared close to tears as he digested another bitter, close defeat in a major tournament.
“I certainly can [beat top players],” said Murray. “It’s clear based on how the match went. I mean, there’s only a few points in it today. Like, it’s not just about winning the odd match against them really. To have a run at these tournaments, you need multiple, multiple wins in a row. Yeah, I’ve obviously not done that.”