Andy Murray produces vintage comeback to beat Lorenzo Sonego at Qatar Open in first appearance since Australian Open

Andy Murray pulled off a trademark comeback victory to beat Lorenzo Sonego within the first spherical of the Qatar Open, the Brit’s first look for the reason that Australian Open.

The 35-year-old wild card received 4-6 6-1 7-6(4) to arrange a final 16 conflict with fourth seed Alexander Zverev of Germany, who was given a bye by way of the primary spherical on the ATP 250 occasion.

Murray was competing for the primary time since his jaw-dropping run in Melbourne, the place he overcame Matteo Berrettini and Thanasi Kokkinakis in 5 units earlier than finally dropping in 4 to Roberto Bautista Agut.

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He needed to battle again from a set all the way down to clinch victory over 27-year-old Sonego, exhibiting typical grit to get throughout the road regardless of hitting one ace to his opponent’s eight and 20 winners to his opponent’s 34, with the Italian’s unforced error rely of 26 finally costing him dearly.

Two-time Doha champion Murray faces Zverev subsequent in a subject that additionally contains the likes of Andrey Rublev, Dan Evans, Daniil Medvedev and Felix Auger-Aliassime.

Murray received off to a disastrous begin, dropping his opening three factors on serve earlier than handing Sonego an early break with a double fault.

The Italian consolidated by holding along with his first ace of the match, earlier than Murray confirmed an excellent response by producing a love maintain in his following service recreation.

The Scot couldn’t discover a method again into the set although, because it stayed on serve and Sonego denied him even a single break level on his method to clinching it 6-4 in 36 minutes.

The previous world No. 1 received off to a flying begin within the second with a love maintain and a break, finally popping out on prime of an epic deuce to transform his fourth break level likelihood.

Within the zone now, Murray put his foot on the accelerator to take a strong maintain, a second break – this time on the third try – and a love maintain to go 5-0 up.

Sonego lastly received on the board with a love maintain of his personal however couldn’t cease the Murray momentum because the 35-year-old landed his first ace of the match to take the second set.

The Italian survived break level to carry serve within the opening recreation of the decider, and it quickly settled right into a sample as each gamers held comfortably because the Italian went 5-4 up, hitting 4 aces in that point.

Murray then displayed classic grit as he went 15-40 down on serve to give up two match factors. He saved each earlier than coughing up one other, solely to save lots of that too and take the subsequent two factors for an enormous maintain.

The match was finally settled by a tie-break. Sonego raced right into a 3-0 lead however once more Murray got here roaring again in opposition to adversity, taking the subsequent six factors in a row earlier than sealing the breaker – and the match – 7-4.