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Andy Murray ripped fellow British tennis player Liam Broady as "a clown" after the two disagreed with their views on Mirra Andreeva´s stunning Australian Open comeback.
Andreeva, 16, created one of the most impressive comebacks at this year´s Australian Open after recovering from 1-5 down in the third set to beat Diane Parry 1-6 6-1 7-6 (5) and reach the round-of-16 in her debut at Melbourne Park. Murray, a three-time Grand Slam champion and a five-time Australian Open finalist, was following Andreeva´s match on TV.
After Andreeva´s stunning comeback, former world No. 1 Murray took to X, where he hit back at the commentator who was blaming Andreeva "bad mental strength" for falling 1-5 down in the decider. In his message, Murray underlined that such a comeback would not have been possible if Andreeva wasn´t a mentally strong player in the first place.
“Andreeva down 5-1 in third. Commentator ‘she really needs to work on mental side of her game... She’s too hard on herself when she’s losing’. 30 minutes later 7-6 Andreeva wins. Maybe the reason she turned the match round is because of her mental strength. Maybe she turned the match around because she is hard on herself and demands more of herself when she’s losing/playing badly? Winner," Murray wrote on X.
Andreeva down 5-1 in third. Commentator “she really needs to work on mental side of her game.. she’s too hard on herself when she’s losing”
— Andy Murray (@andy_murray) January 19, 2024
30 minutes later 7-6 Andreeva wins.
Maybe the reason she turned the match round is because of her mental strength. Maybe she turned the…
Murray calls Broady ´a clown´
Broady, ranked at No. 98 in the world, argued Murray´s perspective, suggesting that the three-time Grand Slam champion should have used "mental composure" instead of "mental strength" to properly describe Andreeva´s comeback.
“Mental strength is the wrong phrase. To come from 5-1 down in the third in a Slam at her age is great mental strength. But perhaps if she had greater mental composure she wouldn’t have gone 5-1 down in the third in the first place?” Broady´s response read.
Reacting to Broady´s response, Murray was pretty blunt: “I don’t understand your tweet. You said mental strength is the wrong phrase and then in the next sentence say coming from 5-1 down is great mental strength. Liam Broady the walking contradiction. (clown emoji)."
I don’t understand your tweet. You said mental strength is the wrong phrase and then in the next sentence say coming from 5-1 down is great mental strength. Liam Broady the walking contradiction. 🤡
— Andy Murray (@andy_murray) January 19, 2024
Andreeva plans to frame Murray´s X post
Andreeva got off to a very slow start to the match, suffering back-to-back and falling 0-5 down early in the match. Andreeva managed to finally get on the board after serving out the sixth game, but it didn´t change much regarding the outcome of the first set Parry served out for the opener in the seventh game.
Through the opening two games of the second set, Andreeva and Parry were tied to one game apiece without breaks on either side. Then, Andreeva rapidly improved her level and won the next five games to clinch the second set in style and force a decider.
Just when it seemed that the whole momentum was on Andreeva´s side, the 16-year-old dropped her service in the second game of the third set. Down by an early break, Andreeva had a chance to instantly get the break back in the third game but she missed out on a break point.
In the fourth game, Andreeva saved a break point but still found herself down by two breaks after Parry broke the Russian in the sixth game for a 5-1 lead. Facing a loss, Andreeva managed to get one break back in the seventh game and then save a match point in the following game on her serve to cut the deficit to 3-5.
With Parry serving for the match for the second time, Andreeva managed to get the second break back as well before successfully serving out the following game to level the third set to five games apiece. In the 11th game, Andreeva earned her third consecutive break to take a 6-5 lead. After winning her fifth consecutive game and giving herself a chance to serve out for the match, Andreeva surprisingly failed to close out the match in the 12th game as Parry got the break back to send their clash into a match tie-break.
In the third-set tie-break, the key moment was Andreeva winning four points in from 3-2 up to open a 7-2 lead. Leading 9-5, Andreeva converted her second match point to complete a major comeback win over Parry.
After the match, Andreeva admitted she was pleasantly surprised about Murray´s post on X. Also, the 16-year-old Russian said she would have it printed.
"Honestly I didn´t really think that he would watch a match, then after he would tweet, he would comment something," Andreeva said after the match.
"Honestly, I will try to print it out somehow. I don´t know, I will put it in a frame. I will bring it everywhere with me. I will maybe put it on the wall so I can see it every day (smiling). Honestly I didn´t expect him to do anything about this match, so..."
In the Australian Open round-of-16, Andreeva plays against 2021 French Open champion Barbora Krejcikova.