Normally I’m not really into tennis…

…but today I’ll make an exception. To be honest, until yesterday I was barely aware the Australian Open was on at all, and certainly had no idea of anyone’s progress. But then, at about nine in the morning, I walked into it on the TV. Andy Murray vs Novak Djokovic, semi-final. Murray is two matches away from his first ever grand slam, but he has to get through not only the world number one, but also his arch-nemesis, Rafael Nadal.
Tennis isn’t really a huge thing for me- I quite like it as a game, I watch Wimbledon when it’s on, I know the basics, but ultimately I’m not that good at it and don’t care about it much. Nonetheless, Murray is a Scot, and as a reasonably patriotic quarter-Scottish Brit who’s fairly into his sport, I thought I’d try too keep track of the game as it went on.
As the day progressed, I had very little time to watch it- I caught a 20-minute patch of a few exchanged third-set games during which precisely nothing happened, dropped in at the start of the 5th set, and rushed over to catch the last two games. Not much, but enough to give me a vague insight into the game as it unfolded. For those who don’t know, Djokovic took the first set, but Murray played impressively to take the second and the third (in a tie break), breaking back on numerous occasions. Djokovic won the fourth set 6-1, Murray had to break back to draw level at 5-5 in the fifth, before conceding a break and the match. Final result: Djokovic 6-3, 3-6, 6-7, 6-1, 7-5.
To me, as the match went on, Murray was playing like, well, how he always does when up against stiff competition. I don’t know if it’s just  mine or the British nation’s collective pessimism, but one can never really be sure of anything when watching Andy Murray- you always get the sensation that he’s about to fire a shot into the net or overshoot. As I say- probably just mindless pessimism.
But, for all his imperfections, for all my worries, for all the cynics’ pessimism about how generally useless we British are at everything (for the record, I HATE those people), on that drawn-out Friday (and for Murray, Saturday), I was proud of him, proud of my man. Completely stupid, I know- I have no personal knowledge of or link with the guy, have a self-professed indifference towards tennis as a rule, and all in all have no real connection with him, let alone a reason to mentally refer to him as ‘mine’. In fact, the only reason I (and quite a lot of his other fans too I suspect) follow him is due to some bull-headed British national pride (my apologies to all Scots reading this, but at least I would refer to him as British if he were losing as well). But that isn’t the point I’m trying to make here. Murray made Djokovic work for his place in the final with every single gram of sweat and effort in his body- the match was almost 5 hours long, the longest match Murray has ever played, and I can attest to the fact that Djokovic spent the majority of the match looking completely knackered. Djokovic didn’t win that match- tennis won, Murray’s mental state won, his estimations and admiration won, sport won.
Sport can be a terrible, horrible thing. It can sometimes be dull, there can sometimes be meaningless thrashings, there can sometimes be horrendous foul play or downright cheating, and worst of all can be sport played solely to win, played solely for the ego of the participants. But sport can also be wonderful, beautiful. Murray’s match was an example of that. He showed us how to fail- with all the effort, pride and dignity of your proudest and greatest victories. There is sport at its best. Nigel Wray, owner of the London rugby club Saracens, famously takes the view that ‘sport’ is the wrong word- ‘teams’ is better, because it emphasises the importance of sport’s camaraderie, friendship, values and teamwork. Even a solo sport like tennis is a game far better played when the emphasis is skill and enjoyment, not just grinding out victories. Rugby is my sport for precisely that reason- it’s ethos and spirit, but any sport played in the correct way, with the correct mindset, is the reason for playing sport at all. Thank you, Andy Murray- you lost magnificently

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