Andy Murray battled through a final set tie-break to beat Netherlands' Tallon Griekspoor and set Great Britain on their way to winning their Davis Cup opener 2-1 against their Dutch opponents.
Murray had to grind out a 6-7 6-4 7-6 win in nearly three hours against the young Dutchman, ranked 179 in the world, but defeat for Dan Evans against Robin Haase in the second game ensured the tie was decided by the doubles rubber after the British No.1 was beaten in three sets.
It looked as though Great Britain were going to have to grind out a third set victory when Jamie Murray and Neal Skupski went 4-1 down in the second set of the deciding doubles, but the Brits came back to beat Wesley Koolhof and Jean-Julien Rojer 6-4 7-6.
Murray’s victory against Griekspoor in the opening match of the tie was the first time the Scot has won a Davis Cup singles match since he last played in the competition in 2016, but he is reluctant to believe he deserved to come out on top.
“I don’t think I deserved to win that match,” said Murray. “I fought extremely hard at the end but he was dictating a lot of the points.
“I thought he served amazingly, he was going for huge second serves to put me on the back foot and it’s difficult when guys are playing like that.
“I just fought hard and made a great scramble at 4-3 in the tie-break to find my way.”
Great Britain will make the Davis Cup quarter-finals if they manage to beat Kazakhstan in Thursday’s second round-robin tie. Sportsbeat 2019