Wimbledon: Andy Murray secures fine straights sets win over Yen-Hsun Lu on Centre Court

The Duchess of Cornwall was in the Royal Box to see the world number two come back after going down a break to Yen-Hsun Lu early in the first set

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It makes a change for Andy Murray not to be the focus of British attention here. The giant-killing exploits of Marcus Willis, Dan Evans and Tara Moore have occupied just as many headlines in the first four days at the All England Club this year, but it will surely be only a matter of time before Britain’s focus returns to the world No 2.

Murray maintained his record of never failing to reach the third round at his home Grand Slam event when he crushed Yen-Hsun Lu 6-3, 6-2, 6-1 in just an hour and 40 minutes. After a patchy start, the 29-year-old Scot produced some sparkling tennis in the latter stages to earn a meeting with Australia’s John Millman, who lost his only previous encounter with Murray at his home tournament in Brisbane three years ago.

From 3-1 down in the opening set, Murray won 17 of the last 20 games to secure his victory. Having also beaten Liam Broady in straight sets in the first round, Murray has achieved his aim of making smoother passage through the first two rounds than he had at the French Open, where he was taken to five sets in successive matches.

If victory over an opponent ranked 74 places beneath him was to be expected, Murray knew that Lu was not an opponent to be treated lightly. The 32-year-old from Taiwan is a proven performer on grass and had won his previous 11 matches on the surface, having claimed successive Challenger titles at Surbiton and Ilkley.

Lu’s confidence on grass was evident in the very first game. With Murray serving at 15-30 Lu chased down a drop shot to hit a forehand winner and then converted the subsequent break point with a drop shot of his own. When he went on told his own serve to 15 to go 2-0 up you could hear a collective drawing of breath around Centre Court.

Before long, nevertheless, normal service was resumed. Murray broke back to level at 3-3 andagain two games later as Lu hit a forehand long when under attack. Lu had two break points in the following game but was unable to prevent Murray serving out for the set.

It had not taken long for the momentum to shift and Murray ensured it would not swing away from him when he broke in the opening game of the second set with a winning forehand cross-court pass. Another break of serve in the seventh game underlined the Scot’s growing domination and Lu won only 12 points in the third set, which Murray took in just 25 minutes.

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“I think I played well in the second and third sets,” Murray said afterwards. “The first set was tough. Both of us had a bunch of chances. There were a lot of deuce games. Once I got that and got an early break in the second, I started to settle down and played better tennis. I finished the match really well.”

Murray said the fact that other British players had deflected attention away from him had not had any effect on his own fortunes. “I’ve played here a number of times, sometimes when there's been big competitions going on elsewhere in different sports, sometimes when some of the other Brits have made deep runs as well,” he said.

“It makes absolutely zero difference to me anyway, how I perform and how I play. When the attention’s been on me a lot, I've played well. When it hasn't, I've also played well. I think it makes no difference.”


 Andy Murray celebrates with the Wimbledon crowd 
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Millman, Murray’s next opponent, reached the third round for the first time by beating France’s Benoit Paire, the No 26 seed, 7-6, 6-3, 4-6, 6-2. Looking ahead to his meeting with Murray, the world No 67 said: “You dream of playing on the biggest courts against the biggest players. I feel as if I deserve to be there. I have played two good matches to get through.”

The 27-year-old Australian, who beat Albert Montanes in the first round, learned just before his victory over Paire that he had been selected to represent his country at the Olympic Games this summer, Nick Kyrgios and Bernard Tomic having made themselves unavailable.

“It means the world to me to be able to represent my country at the Games,” Millman said. “I'm buzzing for that, and then to be able to go out there and put together a pretty good performance out there was awesome today.”