Of course the buzz at Queen’s is all about Andy Murray. Here is a three-time Aegon Championships titlist, the reigning Wimbledon and Olympic champion, playing on his home turf.
For the faithful, it was worth the hot-and-bother effort of edging down narrow walkways between the practice courts that spread behind the towering wall of Centre Court just to catch a glimpse. And even then, fans are kept at arm’s length by an intervening court.
Murray is aiming to win a record-equalling fourth title in this immaculately groomed corner of Kensington, and all the statistics suggest he will do just that: He is second only to Roger Federer and Lleyton Hewitt in both grass titles and grass matches won in the Open era.
What’s more, Murray is the youngest man among the top dozen grass title winners, while only Novak Djokovic—younger than Murray by a week—appears among the top match-winners list, and he trails Murray by 20 wins.
Make no mistake, his first match against Paul-Henri Mathieu was far from easy. The former world No12 won his 20th grass match in his opener without facing a break point in 83 minutes. But Murray had lost only one set to the Frenchman in five meetings, and that was back in 2007.
However, on the most packed day of the week, there were five other men in action who owned grass trophies. Three of them were lurking in the Murray’s half of the draw, too.
In the Briton’s quarter was Sergiy Stakhovsky, winner in s’Hertogenbosch last year and the man who went on to shock Wimbledon by beating Federer in the second round. But he played the No11 seed Vasek Pospisil, one of the most promising young players to emerge in the last year and with a game to thrive on grass. But it was the elegant game of Stakhovsky who sailed through his second straight-sets win to take on Kevin Anderson in the next round.
In the other bottom-half quarter, where second seed Tomas Berdych was already through to the third round, were four-time Queen’s winner Hewitt who took on the winner in Eastbourne last year, Feliciano Lopez—so a former Wimbledon champion against the Spaniard who had reached three quarter-finals at the All England Club.
And should Berdych advance to his allotted meeting with Murray, it was worth remembering that the Czech won Halle in 2007 and reached the Wimbledon final in 2010.
In the event, Hewitt could not replicate the form of his opening match, and Lopez scored his first win over the Australian in their 10-year history, 6-3, 6-4. And following one of the upsets of the tournament so far, he will play Kenny de Schepper, who beat this week’s new No10, Ernests Gulbis.
And what of the top half, lead by world No3 Stan Wawrinka? His best grass result was a final finish in s’Hertogenbosch last year, but he was scheduled to meet the 2010 Queen’s winner Sam Querrey in third round.
In the other quarter, headed by Grigor Dimitrov, were two more two-time grass titlists. Particularly dangerous was Nicolas Mahut, whose pair of wins came last summer. The popular serve-and-volley Frenchman has a game made for grass and, despite being 32 years old, is at a career-equalling high ranking of 40.
Also here was Dmitry Tursunov, a winner in s’Hertogonbosch in 2011 and in Eastbourne 2009, but the No12 seed lost out to another consistent veteran of the tour, Jarkko Nieminen, 7-6, 7-6.
Murray, boasting not just his new coach Amelie Maursemo in his box but a trim new haircut—short and sharp—as well as traditional whites in strong contrast to the bright yellow and dark blue combo of last year. Perhaps he wanted to get into the mood for Wimbledon.
It worked, too, and he broke in the opening game. Mathieu, a crafty player with plenty of slice and a decent serve, almost broke him back in the fourth and, to his credit, he kept the gap between them to just the one break, serving for 3-4 with an ace.
He survived deuce again at 3-5, but both men were putting on a good show of drop shots, lobs and skimming sliced backhands. Murray had to serve it out, 6-4.
The Briton looked like making an early break in the second set, too, but Mathieu proved to be a tough nut to crack. He saved a first break point in the third game with an ace, scored a drop-shot winner on the second, and held for 2-1.
The fifth game brought another chance for Murray, but in the rally of the match, with chased-down drops and lobs on both sides, it was Murray who ended up down and out on the ground and Mathieu who took the game. The Frenchman, though, could not resist much longer and Murray broke through for a 4-3 lead.
There was a moment of panic on British faces when Murray double faulted to go 15-40 down, but four big serves helped his cause, he held, and then served out the set with ease, 6-4.
He will next play another fine serve-and-volley player, the 35-year-old Radek Stepanek, who beat Bernard Tomic, but Murray’s work ended on a particularly uplifting note.
The Aegon Championships received the 2013 ATP award for best 250 event in the tennis calendar. It meant that Ross Hutchins, appointed as the new tournament director this year, received the crystal trophy, even if he declined to take any credit. And Murray was on hand to do the honours, on the same court where he played his exhibition match last year in support of the Royal Marsden Hospital that had treated Hutchins for Hodgkins lymphoma.
Not a bad way to mark a rather special anniversary.
Footnote: Wawrinka advanced when Marcos Baghdatis retired injured at 3-2.