I wasn't expecting to play like that: Andy Murray over his Miami Open defeat
Mar 23, 2023
Miami [US], March 23 : Andy Murray said that he was surprised with his flat performance on Wednesday at the Miami Open after suffering a straight-sets loss to Serbian Dusan Lajovic.
World No. 76 Dusan Lajovic upset two-time former champion Murray 6-4, 7-5 on Day 1 of men's main-draw action at the Miami Open on Wednesday.
The two-time Miami champion lamented that he expected more given that he entered the competition having won two matches at the Indian Wells Open and coming off of positive practice sessions at Hard Rock Stadium.
"I'd been practising pretty well. It's a very different court here, very bouncy, much faster than last week. Very different to the practice courts and everything," ATP.com quoted Murray as saying.
"The ball was bouncing up a bit higher and I just miss-timed quite a few balls. Sometimes on the slice it was shooting through a little bit more, kind of shanked a couple shots off the slice, as well... I wasn't expecting to play like that, even based on the last few days because I've been decent in practice," Murray said.
Murray said that the different playing conditions in Indian Wells affected him during match against World No. 76 Lajovic.
"I served pretty well, but the rest of the game was a bit of a problem today. Didn't really return that well, made a number of errors that obviously I wouldn't expect to be making," Murray said of the 6-4, 7-5 defeat.
"I didn't really feel like I moved particularly well, which is really important for me, something I've been doing very well actually in most of the matches this year. So that was probably the thing. Some days you obviously don't hit the ball your best, but my movement wasn't great today," he added.
Murray stated that he had not yet made up his mind on whether he would stay in Miami a little longer to start getting ready for the clay swing, but he added that he would be returning to Spain before the end of the month, where he would be reunited with his family and start a training block.
Murray has 14 ATP Masters 1000 titles among his 46 career triumphs. His most recent win at this level came in Paris/Bercy in 2016, when he first rose to No. 1 in the ATP Rankings.
