Andy Murray and Kei Nishikori advanced to the third round at Wimbledon. Murray took a comfortable 6-3 6-2 6-1 win over Yen Hsun Lu on Centre Court. Kei Nishikori rallied from a set down to beat Julien Benneteau 4-6 6-4 6-4 6-2.
Thirty-two year-old Lu, who returned from elbow injury last month, got an early break to 15 in the opening game of the match after a poor drop-shot from Murray and held his serve in the second game to open up a 2-0. Lu raced out to a 3-1 lead but Murray broke back to 30 in the sixth game with a drop-shot to draw level to 3-3. The 2013 Wimbledon champion got another break in the 8th game to love as Lu made two forehand errors and saved two break points to hold his serve completing his comeback from 1-3 down by winning his fifth consecutive game.
In the second and third sets Murray broke serve five times, hit 23 winners and dropped just 11 points on serve.
Murray got an early break in the first game of the second set. Lu saved two break points in the fifth game to hold his serve for 2-3. Murray got a double break in the seventh game to take a 5-2 lead and held his service game to 15 to seal the second set.
Murray broke serve to love at the start of the third set and consolidated the break to 15 to hold his service game with an ace. The Dunblane star got the double break in the third game to 15 to race out to a 3-0 lead. Lu held his first service game of the third set to get his first game on the scoreboard for 1-4. Murray broke serve for the third time in the set in the final game of the match to clinch the third set 6-1 as Lu made a double fault on the match point.
Murray, who won his fifth Queen’s title on grass two weeks ago, will take on John Millman, who beat Benoit Paire.
“The first set was tough. There were a lot of close games. I managed to hang on at the end of the first and then settled down towards the end of the second, and was hitting the ball much better in the third and feel more comfortable. If you can win matches easily it does help because you can rest. It has been a good start. I will just try and do my best, work hard, keep my head down and hopefully have a good tournament”, said Murray.
Kei Nishikori rallied from a set down to beat Julien Benneteau 4-6 6-4 6-4 6-2 setting up a third round against Kuznetsov.
Benneteau, who used protected ranking after being plagued by a serious injury, was the first to earn a break point in the second game of the opening set. Both players were on serve at 4-3 when the match was interrupted for 15 minutes due to a rain delay. In the 10th game the Frenchman got the only break of the first set at deuce to take the first set 6-4.
The first six games of the second set went on serve until Nishikori got the only break to take a 4-3 lead with a backhand winner.
The Japanese player got a double break in the fifth and seventh games of the third set to race out to a 5-2 lead: Benneteau got one of the two breaks back and consoldated his break to win his second consecutive game for 4-5 but Nishikori served out for the set to 15 on his second set point with an ace. Nishikori got a double break in the first and fifth games to open up a 4-1 lead to close out the match with a backhand winner. Nishikori hit 47 winners to 22 unforced errors.
Nishikori will face Andrey Kuznetsov, who beat Gilles Muller 6-3 6-4 6-4. Kuznetsov did not face a break point and hit 42 winners to 8 unforced errors. Nishikori and Kuznetsov tied 1-1 in their previous two head-to-head matches.
