Another win today for Andy Murray, which lands him into the quarterfinals for a second time in his career (2009). He will face world #6 David Ferrer next; I really hope that Ferrer takes it to Andy, especially after his recent on court antics. It all started in his match against Jarkko Nieminen, Murray’s back start to “spasm” during the match. Now, I totally understand back problems and how painful they can be, though Murray’s acting ability could have won him an Oscar, especially when he would lose a point.
Murray’s back only seemed to bother him when he would lose a point, though when he hit a winner or Jarkko made an unforced error his back seemed normal. Somehow, the Brit managed to miraculously heal his back as the match went on and finished off the Finnish player in four sets. By the looks of how he was grabbing at his back, it would have seemed that he was being stabbed or somebody was ripping out his spine.
His match today, against Frenchman Richard Gasquet, there were more of the same crap that Andy Murray pulled earlier in the tournament. Again, Murray was down a set, and all of the sudden the back started to bother him again. Grabbing at it, cringing in pain, and being overly dramatic about what was going on. Yet, somehow, Murray’s back seemed to be just fine when he would hit winners or Gasquet would come up with an error.
Let me get this straight, Andy Murray’s back only hurts when he loses a point but is perfectly OK when he wins a point? Please, can I have your back Andy? Mine seems to hurt when I hit a winner or an error.
Watch this video of Andy Murray, watch how he grabs at his back when he loses a point, you can even hear John McEnroe say that he should retire from this match:
The icing on the cake is that Murray somehow got it together and won the match against Gasquet, in four sets. How is that even possible? Again, it looked like Murray was in complete agony, yet he pulled out the win. This begs the question, is Andy Murray cheating when he’s blatantly making gestures that he is in pain or seriously hurt? Well, there is no actual rule in the ITF or ATP rulebook, but I would absolutely call his actions a hindrance to the other players. I’m not quite sure why the chair umpires didn’t say anything to Murray about him ailing on court after a lost point.
We all have experienced that moment, when your opponent, no matter what sport, seems to have injured himself. We, as humans, tend to ease up on the person; it gets in our heads, we don’t want to hurt the wounded. So what Andy Murray has done, is created a situation where he’s the “injured puppy” and his opponents react to that by easing up, it’s subconscious; Nieminem and Gasquet both subconsciously stopped playing their game when they saw that Murray was in pain, unfortunately for the two, they were not mentally strong enough to shake that away and close the door on Murray.
In the quarterfinals, Andy Murray will face David Ferrer, which I believe will absolutely give Murray something to wince about. The Spaniard is a total grinder and will be in every single point. Murray can try to cheat his way through this match, but I’m certain that David will just call his bluff. Ferrer has beaten Murray every one of the three meetings on clay.
Finally, is Andy Murray a cheater? Well, depends on who you ask.