The first real heart stopping, fist pumping epic on the big screen was a doubtful pleasure. The pale, haunted face of lead character Andy Murray played out for almost three and a half hours with smoky matinee idol, Fernando Verdasco, in a tale of swinging fortune, one ready made for a giddy Centre Court crowd, all of them hell bent on pouring out their love.
In the backdrop fellow Scot and former Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson sat next to his former player Nemanja Vidic, who had arrived in the Royal Box to support Serbian Novak Djokovic, who also won through to the semi-final with a straight set win over Tomas Berdych.
At last year's US Open Ferguson and actor Sean Connery gate crashed Murray's semi-final press conference with the manager confessing that he gets more nervous watching the tennis player than he did his football team.
Yesterday bore all the reasons of why that is so as the number two seed came back from two sets down for the seventh time in his career to win 4-6, 3-6, 6-1, 6-4, 7-6 over Spain’s Fernando Verdasco.
The championship had been lacking the traditional Wimbledon stamp of biblical comebacks and lurching emotions. Yesterday a venal Murray accommodated all of those. From a wretched player screaming “what the f**k are you doing?” at the gods of tennis after dropping the first two sets, he was the lead act milking applause. It was all exhausting.
Whoever wrote the bold one sided narrative for the first 80 minutes and had Murray drop the first set and then lose the second from 3-1 up before entirely changing the direction for the closing two hours, had drama in mind.
“The second set was a bad set of tennis for me,” said Murray. “I was 3-1 up and made some poor choices on the court and then turned it round. After that I changed tactics, was a bit more patient, didn’t rush and didn’t give him any free points. When you play matches and gain experience, you know how to turn matches around and learn how to change momentum.”
Struggle
The Spaniard had no form and little reason to be in the quarter-final, never mind pull on British nerves for two sets. Ranked 54 in the world and having lost more matches than he had won this year, his left hand and top spin was always a concern but never a weapon Murray would have envisaged he would struggle to accommodate.
Verdasco whipped his ground strokes all over the court sometimes Steffi Graf-like running around the ball to his favoured forehand. In tune with heavy, consistent serving he had Murray on a string running widths.
He took the serve of Murray once in the first set and twice in the second for 2-0. The clutch game for the Scot came shortly after his furious expletive laden tirade directed at himself during the break. There he looked bent out of shape and baying at an imaginary moon, prompting a swift apology from the BBC.
In the first game of the third set more bad decisions made Murray’s service game fraught. But he held for 1-0 and the rehabilitation process began from there as he ripped through the set 6-1.
Barely 50 minutes later the number two seed had three set points and took the first, propelling the match into a final set shootout as shadows stretched across the grass, just a quarter segment of court bathed in sunshine.
At 5-5, with Verdasco serving, Murray summoned up the courage to grasp the moment and winning a 20 stroke rally for break point turned the screw. It was Verdasco who now doubted. The Spaniard had come into the match with nothing to lose. But after two sets up he had more to lose than he could have conceived. The pressure shifted.
A backhand wide to Verdasco returned into the net. Murray had his break and served for the match, comfortably earning four match points before closing it out.
“Yeah, he really went for it and he served extremely well,” added Murray. “I mean, I wouldn’t say I was surprised in terms of the pace he was serving at because, you know, you can check the stats from the other matches and he’s been serving big the whole tournament.”
Verdasco is a player Murray’s mother Judy admires. It might have been difficult to play against him, it was suggested. “No,” said Murray flatly without elaborating.
He now meets Poland's Jerzy Janowicz, who beat his compatriot Lubasz Kubot in straight sets, 6-2, 6-4, 7-6(5). Djokovic meets former US Open winner Juan Del Potro in the other half of the draw.
The eighth seed, Del Potro put out the fourth seed Spain’s David Ferrer after a first set scare when Del Potro fell and appeared to twist a heavily bandaged knee. But he pulled through with disarming ease 6-2, 6-4, 7-6(5).
