Andy Murray returns to a final two years later

Andy Murray is showing at the Tennis Sydney Classic that he is still on the right track in the fight to show his best tennis again in the run-up to the Australian Open, a tournament to which he will return after three years of absence.

The former world number one and double Olympic and Wimbledon champion has returned to a final of an ATP tournament tAfter more than two years of absence, when he lifted the title at the Antwerp tournament in 2019, after beating the American Reilly Opelka in a demanding match 6-7 (6), 6-4 and 6-4 after two and a half hours of battle.

The match started with Murray and Opelka very solid on serve. So much so that in the first set there was no break option, so it was decided in a tie-break in which Opelka showed his ability with the serve (he hit up to 20 aces) to win the first set 6-7 (6).

In the second set there was the same trend as the first until in the third game Murray managed to break Opelka’s serve to take advantage on the scoreboard. In fact, the Scotsman was able to close the set with a set point to return, but he finally did it on his serve with a loveless game 6-4 to force the third and final set.

In this third round, Murray once again put Opelka in trouble, who also had options to break the Scotsman, although without success. A fact that ended up paying as Murray did break the American’s serve in the ninth game to close the set and the match on serve with a scoreless game 6-4.

Now Murray will face off in the final with Russian Aslan Karatsev, who avoided a British final after defeating Daniel Evans 6-3, 6-7 (13) and 6-3, in search of a new title before the Australian Open.