By Chris Oddo | Sunday June 19, 2016
Faced with a bomb-serving Canadian in menacing form, down by a set and a break and running out of time, Andy Murray saw his moment, stepped in and went for it. The result? A stunning, momentum-changing backhand that brought the Queen’s Club crowd to its feet and Milos Raonic back down to earth.
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With one fell swoop, Murray snapped the Canadian’s streak of 55 consecutive holds and and provided himself with the impetus to march to a 6-7(5), 6-4, 6-3 victory to claim his record fifth title at the prestigious London club.
It was a clutch backhand return winner from the man that always seems to deliver on home soil, and it got him back on serve at 2-3 in the second set. Suddenly a match that had been slipping away was within his grasp again.
“I started getting a slightly better read on the serve,” said Murray after the match. “And that makes a huge difference on this surface against someone like Milos. When I was able to get the return back to a decent length or get a good hit on it I was able to do a bit more damage in the rallies.”
Murray broke again in the seventh game of the second set to claim the 4-3 lead and held twice to force a decider.
In the third set the Scot made it three breaks of the vaunted Raonic serve to take a 1-0 lead in set one when he feathered a perfect dropper at the end of a long rally.
When asked where he could have served to achieve better results against the Murray return game, Raonic replied: “Try to go through him. Maybe I can blow a hole through his stomach next time, we’ll try.”
Murray, now roaring through his service games, didn’t need to serve out his title. He broke Raonic on his third championship point as the Canadian dumped a volley into the net. Murray improves to 30-5 lifetime at Queen's and 95-17 lifetime on grass.
Murray says he’s most pleased with his level of consistency at all events on all surfaces as he heads to the third major of 2016 with heaps of momentum. “I know right now I’m obviously playing at a good level,” he said. “The consistency is something I’ve been very happy with the last few months, so I need to keep that up now the next week or so.”
As far as winning a fifth title at Queen’s to surpass legends such as Boris Becker, John McEnroe, Lleyton Hewitt, Andy Roddick and Roy Emerson, Murray says it means a lot.
“Very special,” he added. “Many great players have played here over the years and won four times so to be the first to do five, it means a lot. It’s the tournament where I won my first ever ATP match so for it now to be by far my most successful event it means a lot.”