Andy Murray beats Nick Kyrgios and Serena Williams in IPTL
- Published
Britain's Andy Murray picked up two wins on his final day of involvement at the International Premier Tennis League exhibition in the Philippines.
Murray helped Manila Mavericks beat Singapore Slammers 27-19 to claim their first victory of the event.
The Scot and Kirsten Flipkens beat Serena Williams and Lleyton Hewitt 6-1 in the mixed doubles.
Murray then saw off Australian Nick Kyrgios 6-5 in the singles, which was decided by a five-minute shootout.
IPTL teams |
|---|
Indian Aces (Delhi): Federer, Sampras, Monfils, Ivanovic, Mirza, Bopanna, Santoro |
Manila Mavericks: Murray, Tsonga, Flipkens, Nestor, Moya, Sharapova, Huey |
Singapore Slammers: Serena Williams, Agassi, Berdych, Hewitt, Kyrgios, Hantuchova, Soares, Rafter |
UAE Royals (Dubai): Djokovic, Wozniacki, Cilic, Mladenovic, Ivanisevic, Zimonjic, Jaziri |
It brought an end to the Briton's participation in the inaugural IPTL, and he will now head to Miami to begin his annual off-season training block.
"I think a lot of people were sceptical about it," Murray said of the IPTL.
"But if you look at the amount of people who have showed up here, there's been unbelievable support from Friday through to Sunday; it shows the people here love tennis. I hope we can come back next year and do it again."
After failing to register a victory over the first two days in Manila, Murray got on the scoreboard alongside Flipkens in a one-sided doubles as world number one Williams made her debut in the competition.
The American made amends in the following singles set with a 6-3 win over Flipkens.
It looked as though Murray's year would end with a defeat when he trailed the big-serving Kyrgios 5-4, but the former Wimbledon champion broke back to force a shootout.
IPTL innovations |
|---|
Each match consists of five sets: men's singles, women's singles, mixed doubles, men's doubles, legends' singles |
The team that wins the most games, accumulated from all five sets, wins the match |
Each set is played first to six games with a five-minute shoot-out at 5-5 |
Players have a 20-second shot clock between points |
Team coaches can call a 60-second time-out once during each set |
The receiving player can call a Power Point once every set, indicating that the next point counts double |
With the 20-second shot clock driving the pace of play and the winner decided over the course of five minutes, Murray let a 4-0 lead slip and led 6-5 as the clock counted down.
A lengthy baseline rally had the crowd enthralled with victory up for grabs, and Kyrgios cracked first with a backhand into the net.
The four-team competition will now move to Singapore for three days, starting on Tuesday, before heading to Delhi and Dubai. Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer are among the players set to feature.
The Indian Aces celebrated another victory with a few dance moves
Williams made her first appearance in the IPTL on Sunday
The Manila Mavericks celebrate getting their first victory on day three of the competition
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