Andy Murray Advances to Third Round of Australian Open – The American Spectator

In the best and most dramatic match of the 2023 tennis tour — which admittedly is only in its third week — Britain’s toughest, grittiest, grouchiest, most big-hearted player, Andy Murray of Glasgow, Scotland, came back from two sets and 3–5 to snatch victory from the jaws of Thanasi Kokkinakis.

The second-round Australian Open match ended sometime before dawn in Melbourne Park, five and three-quarter hours after it began. There have been many long matches in the century-old history of the Grand Slam circuit, and there have been many a breathtaking comebacks. In fact, they are not uncommon. Rafael Nadal won this very tournament last year after dropping the first two sets; Dominic Thiem did the same at the U.S. Open in 2021. I could look up the whole history, but my Bud Collins History of Tennis is not at hand. Tennis is a game of dramatic momentum shifts, and, as is said of baseball, it ain’t over ’till it’s over.

Observe, however, that these recent matches were Slam finals. At the last match of a two-week endurance test at one of the four most prestigious tournaments on the tour, the last two men standing are at the top rung of the will-to-win, and fatigue does not enter the equation. They are so fired up and focused that two sets down is scarcely noticed except that it gets the adrenaline flowing even faster than seems anatomically possible.

Here, it was only the second round. And with Andy Murray, beyond the brilliance of his game, there is a rare ability to put everything into every single match he plays. At 35 and with two hip surgeries, he could be excused for thinking that he made his point by reaching the second round. And it would be no dishonor against the 26-year-old Aussie from Adelaide, with one of the strongest serves in the game and a lightning forehand to keep you moving from alley to alley without pity. Murray does not want your pity. He wants you to suffer more than he does.

Suffer or not, Thanasi Kokkinakis had every right to feel frustrated; Murray’s defensive play against even slam volleys from the net and apparent winners to both wings kept the balls in play until he could set up his own play — and as a play-setter, he is endlessly inventive.

Exhilarating as the match was, it cannot but give one pause — as it notably did to our Double E, vernacular for executive editor, here at The American Spectator. The fighting spirit is admirable and is one of the lessons imparted by sports, but the question lingers: what if surgery amounts to an unfair advantage?

Rafa Nadal lost in straight sets to Californian Mackenzie McDonald in the same second round, visibly suffering and slowed in his movements, though battling all the way through. (There is only one case on record — to our recollection — when the injury-prone Nadal forfeited before the end of a match.) He was diagnosed with a hip flexor injury that will sideline him for six to eight weeks.

Murray had arthroscopic surgery in 2018 and hip resurfacing surgery the following year. The first intervention addresses joint deterioration, the second stabilizes the ball-in-socket mechanism in the hip.

In the procedure called ulnar collateral ligament reconstruction, UCL or Tommy John surgery, torn elbow ligaments are repaired with the use of ligaments taken from other parts of the body, rather than metallic materials.

The matter commands reflection, but there are no reports from Melbourne that it came up at the press briefings. Andy Murray, who is articulate on social and health issues, espoused the kind of vaccine mandates at tournaments that kept Novak Djokovic from competing last year. The world No. 1 admitted to a hamstring injury following his second-round win over France’s Enzo Couacaud.

It could be argued that Kokkinakis, the younger man, brought defeat on himself. He missed crucial, easy winners that would have been decisive in the second set, one at 5–3, 30–15 if memory serves, and then he made a mess of the eventual tiebreak. At that point, his spirit must have fissured (I will not say cracked, I was not there), and it was with a mighty surge that Murray took charge over the next two sets. But what if his partly mechanical hip was “carrying” him more durably than the younger man’s own legs?

It is possible to lose a tennis match; but putting it this way misses the more important point, which is that the other fellow won it. Poor play is caused by rich play. Someone causes you to lose, and this was a spectacular demonstration of this axiom. Murray’s determination and courage are not in question; the boost he got from medical engineering someday may be viewed as a performance enhancer in need of regulation.

Murray has a tough third round next, against the resilient and patient Spanish baseliner Roberto Bautista-Agut, and if he gets past him, he will meet an American in the fourth. The young Americans have been impressive, but it will take more than skill and hunger to take down the stubborn and superb Scot, Andy Murray.