The Sports Lowdown For All Your News and OpinionsAndy Murray made the perfect start in his bid for a second Wimbledon title as the world number two eased past fellow Brit Liam Broady 6-2 6-3 6-4. Murray dominated the early exchanges to cruise through the first set and even though Broady improved as the match wore on, the former champion did enough to earn a straight sets win.
In the first set, Murray made a quick start and sealed the early break after out-manoeuvring his opponent in a rally, before emphatically consolidating his advantage for a 3-0 lead. Broady though eventually settled to finally hold his serve, but he found Murray too solid and strong in the baseline exchanges. The world number two continued to rattle through his own service games and soon enough Murray’s overall dominance was further rewarded when he broke his opponent again to gain the set.
As the second set unfolded, both players held their opening games but Murray’s combination of deep and powerful groundstrokes was simply too much for Broady, as the lower ranked Brit conceded his serve with a costly double fault to fall behind 3-1. The world number two was relentless as he easily extended his lead and even though Broady battled hard to reduce the deficit, one break was enough for Murray to eventually seize the second set following another confident hold of serve.
In the third set, Broady was under early pressure again on his serve and Murray fully capitalised by breaking his opponent in the first game of the set. The former champion was in complete control of the match as he held before crafting more break points on his opponent’s serve, using precise shot-making to take the upper hand. However, this time Broady stood firm to erase them all and in the following game, he almost capitalised on a slight lapse in concentration from his opponent to get back into the contest. Murray though managed to survive the break points to keep his lead intact and even though Broady pushed him all the way to serve for the match, the former champion wrapped up the victory with a delicate drop shot to book his place in a second round clash against Yen-Hsun Lu.
As for the other Brits, Dan Evans and Tara Moore secured wins but the biggest story of the tournament so far came when qualifier Marcus Willis set up an encounter with Roger Federer after stunning higher ranked opponent Ricardas Berankis in straight sets. However, Kyle Edmund, Laura Robson, Aljaz Bedene and Naomi Broady exited the tournament along with Alex Ward and Brydan Klein, whilst James Ward put up a battling display before going down 6-0 7-6 6-4 to world number one Novak Djokovic. In addition, Johanna Konta was leading Monica Puig by a set in their clash when play was suspended for the day due to rain, meaning that a few first round matches are still yet to be completed.
Meanwhile, Milos Raonic recorded a 7-6 6-2 6-4 win over Pablo Carreno Busta, as Kei Nishikori, Stan Wawrinka and Nick Kyrgios all moved through to the second round.
On the women’s side, Serena Williams opened the defence of her title with a 6-2 6-4 victory over Amra Sadikovic, joining her sister Venus, Garbine Muguruza and Simona Halep in the next round. Former SW19 finalist Sabine Lisicki, Svetlana Kuznetsova and Madison Keys also progressed but Ana Ivanovic was knocked out by Ekaterina Alexandrova.
