Andy Murray acknowledged that it was «really difficult» against Lorenzo Sonego, but said he knew the Italian was an aggressive player who would go out and go for it. Murray, who received a main draw wild card in Dubai, saved three match points to beat Sonego in the first round 4-6, 6-1, 7-6(4).
«It was very hard. We never played together or practiced together before so I didn’t know exactly how the match was going to go and it took me a while to get used to his game. He is a very aggressive player, he takes a lot of risks, but it is high-risk tennis.
He rolled the dice at the end and it seemed like he had the momentum. But luckily in the middle of that tiebreaker he made a couple of mistakes and I managed to turn it around,» Murray said, according to the ATP website.
How did Murray defeat Sonego?
Murray got off to a slow start to the match, losing serve in the first game of the match.
Breaking early, Sonego held serve for the remainder of the first set to win the opening set. After losing the first set, Murray rallied and started the second set with back-to-back breaks and a 5-0 lead. In the seventh game, Murray routinely served for the second set.
After easily winning the second set, Murray had a break point in the first game of the third set but missed it. With Sonego winning 5-4 and Murray serving to stay in the match – the Italian had three match points – but the Brit saved them all to tie the third set at five games apiece.
After wasting three match points, Sonego began the third set tie-break leading 3-0. But Murray responded impressively, winning the next six points to take a 6-3 lead and secure three straight match points. Sonego saved the first match point, but Murray grabbed his second match point to set up a round of 16 encounter in Dubai against Alexander Zverev.
