Andy Murray knows that a straight-sets win over Jo-Wilfried Tsonga on Friday will guarantee a semi-final place at the ATP World Tour Finals. The Briton goes into the final round of Group A matches in second place, having beaten Tomas Berdych and lost to top seed Novak Djokovic.
Murray takes on Tsonga at 19:45 GMT, after Djokovic plays Berdych at 13:45. A Djokovic win would ease Murray’s task as he would then only need a set against the Frenchman. All four men go into Friday still able to secure one of the two semi-final places on offer in the group, and there are 10 different qualification scenarios. It is a situation Murray has experienced before, notably in 2009, when he won two group matches but was still eliminated on the percentage of games won.
He at least has the advantage of playing last on Friday, so will know exactly what he has to do against Tsonga. “Who knows what the scenario will be when I get on the court but I’ll just try my best to win,” said Murray. “There are no easy matches here and you need to be prepared for some tough battles.”
The message was the same from Djokovic who, despite having won both his opening matches, could still suffer the same fate as Murray three years ago with a poor result against Berdych.
“I will try not to depend on some other players’ scores and matches,” said the world number one. “I will try to focus and win every match that I play.” Murray can take encouragement from a one-sided 6-1 record against Tsonga that includes victories in their last five matches.
He beat the Frenchman over four sets in the Wimbledon semi-final this summer and has not lost to the world number eight since 2008.“I just have to play the Tsonga match and try to win regardless of what situation either of us are in,” added Murray.
“It doesn’t matter what has gone before, I just have to win. We are not used to the round-robin format in tennis because we play knockout everywhere else apart from here. That is the tradition of the tournament and it’s fine. As professional sportsmen we should be able to deal with all sorts of situations and focus regardless.”
Fellow Briton Jonny Marray faces a less nerve-wracking evening after he and Danish partner Freddie Nielsen secured a place in the doubles semi-final with wins in their opening two matches.
The Wimbledon champions complete the group stage when they take on Swede Robert Lindstedt and Horia Tecau of Romania at 18:00.
