By Ricky Dimon
Amidst Andy Murray’s 2013 struggles that may be attributed to either recovery from back surgery and/or his split from coach Ivan Lendl, it should not be overlooked that his brother is getting along quite nicely this spring.
Heading into Munich, Jamie and Australian partner John Peers had reached two semifinals in their past two tournaments (Casablanca and Bucharest). By comparison, they had previously advanced to just one semifinal in the first three months of the year (Brisbane). On Sunday, Jamie–and Peers–remained in fine form by defeating fellow Brits Colin Fleming and Ross Hutchins 6-4, 6-2 for the Munich title.
Jamie won for the 11th time in his ATP doubles career and improved to 4-1 lifetime with Peers in ATP finals.
“We played really well this week,” the elder Murray brother said. “We had a really enjoyable week and it is a really good tournament. We hung out with Ross and Colin all week. It was cruel someone had to lose, but that is the way it is.”
Fleming and Hutchins were making an appearance in their first ATP final as a team since the 2012 Kuala Lumpur event. Hutchins, of course, missed all of 2013 due to Hodgkin’s lymphoma.
“It’s a real honor to be in a final again,” Hutchins assured. “We haven’t played a final for 20 months now, so it was fantastic to be there. It was a pleasure to compete against Jamie and John, who played really well. It is nice for British tennis, when we are all doing well.”
Jamie and Peers will hope to keep doing well at the upcoming Madrid Masters (Fleming and Hutchins are not in the draw). The British-Aussie duo is opening up against Mariusz Fyrstenberg and Marcin Matkowski. They could face Australian Open champs Robert Lindstedt and Lukasz Kubot in the second round before a possible date with the Bryan brothers in the quarterfinals.
Singles players in the doubles draw include Tomas Berdych and John Isner, who are pairing up with each other. Berdych and Isner will contest their first match against Jonathan Erlich and Lukas Rosol.
Topics: Andy Murray, Atp, British Tennis, Jamie Murray, Tennis News
FOR ONCE, IT’S NOT ANDY MURRAY IN THE BRITISH SPOTLIGHT IT’S OLDER BRO JAMIE – http://t.co/bvZcbwxr36 @jamie_murray #British #tennis