Andy Murray promises relentless charge to dethrone rival Novak Djokovic as world No1
Britain's Andy Murray has promised a relentless pursuit of ranking points as he bids to dethrone rival Novak Djokovic and end the year as world No1.
Murray trails Djokovic by 2,415 points although the prospect remains for the 29-year-old, who has won Wimbledon and an Olympic gold medal in 2016, to usurp the Serb at next month’s ATP World Tour Finals in London.
Victory at this week’s Erste Bank Open in Vienna would hand Murray 500 ranking points, while bettering Djokovic’s results at next week’s Masters 1000 event in Paris and the London spectacle could see the Scot hit top spot.
“If you talk about getting to No1, it’s not about individual tournaments, it’s about a 12-month period and you want to be consistent and get to the latter stages of as many tournaments as possible,” said Murray, who begins his campaign in Vienna with a clash against Slovakia’s Martin Klizan on Wednesday.
“I’ve done that the last few months and I will obviously l try to do so again over the next few events.
“It’s not about one event, it’s about a total season of 17,18 tournaments and whoever performs best over them will get there and right now that’s Novak but I’ll try my best to finish as strong as I can.”
Fellow Briton Kyle Edmund, meanwhile, was forced to retire from his first round match with Spain’s David Ferrer at the Erste Open yesterday due to injury.
The 21-year-old, who reached his first ATP Tour semi-final in Antwerp last week, lasted just 18 minutes of the showdown before succumbing to what appeared to be a hip injury. Ferrer was leading 3-2 in the first set.
Women’s world No1 Angelique Kerber overcame Romania’s Simona Halep 6-4, 6-2 to seal her place in the last four of the WTA Finals in Singapore.