Murray digs holes and then fills them in

TENNIS:NOBODY CURRENTLY at work on a tennis court, surely, is such a slave to his muse as is Andy Murray. For most of the two hours and 53 minutes of the Scot's pot-holed ride into his first semi-final at the French Open, poor Juan Ignacio Chela was almost incidental to the narrative on Court Suzanne Lenglen.

Chela, the oldest contender left standing and the softest touch, played neither brilliantly nor awfully. Murray, recovering from the ankle he rolled on Saturday, beat the 31-year-old Chilean clay-courter for the seventh time in a row, 7-6 7-5 6-2, but he alternately flirted with disaster and thrilled the gallery with his flickering genius. “I didn’t play very well, but it had nothing to do with my ankle,” Murray said.

Tomorrow he plays Rafael Nadal, and it could be a match with a little more edge than some of their 14 previous encounters. Straining not to offend his friend, Nadal wondered aloud, after his most assured performance of the tournament, a straight-sets win over Robin Soderling, if Murray’s injured ankle was as debilitating as had been assumed.

“The pain is on the ankle?” he inquired. “I have sometimes (suffered) this in the past. In my opinion, it is not going to affect him or his confidence. He played a five-set match and today played a tough match and he keeps winning. Probably he has pain, but the pain is not limiting. He’s playing well. He’s a big player.”

Murray did sound a little cheerier later: “I wasn’t moving great, but I was moving a lot better (going) forward.”

So on Sunday Murray will either be strapping up his still tender right ankle for a fourth shot at a grand slam or he will be sitting at home in Surrey wondering if Nadal knows him better than he knows himself.

Chela almost surreptitiously sneaked into a 4-1 lead in the first set as Murray choked on his forehand (evidence of the cramping effect of his injury), refused two simple smashes, lobbed weakly and watched drop shots fall short of his late gallops to the net. Roused, he broke back, held to love, saved two set points and, with a sublime ace on his second serve, got back to 4-5 before taking the set. He was similarly inconsistent in the second, but hit a rhythm in the third.

Still, Murray has reached the semi-final of a clay court tournament for the third time this year – after Monte Carlo and Rome – and will be heartened the partially torn tendon in his right ankle is hanging together. It did not seem to inconvenience him yesterday as much as his fluctuating demeanour. He screamed, talked to himself, looked to the heavens, called down the devil and laughed the laugh of an exasperated artist.

As entertaining a piece of theatre as it was, a repeat performance will see him perish at the hands of the defending champion. While Murray was digging holes for himself and then filling them in, Nadal was rewriting his earlier downbeat assessment of his chances of winning the tournament for the sixth time – and equalling the record of Bjorn Borg – by beating Soderling 6-4 6-1 7-6.

Asked if he thought the Spaniard was disingenuous doubting he could keep his title, Murray said: “I know Rafa will play excellent tennis against me. Even in practice he plays well against me – so, no, I don’t expect him to play badly on Friday.”

Guardian Service