That's what briton andy murray asked yesterday after confusion reigned over his semi-final qualification at the atp world tour finals
That's what briton andy murray asked yesterday after confusion reigned over his semi-final qualification at the atp world tour finals
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Briton Andy Murray reacts during a match against Spain's Fernando Verdasco in the ATP World Tour Finals in London yesterday. pic/AFP |
"Anyone know what's going on?" asked Andy Murray. He didn't know, Roger Federer didn't know, and Juan Martin del Potro thought he did know, but he was wrong.
That was the nail-biting situation at London's O2 Arena as three of the planet's top tennis players were left clueless as to whether they had made it through to the semi-finals of the season-ending ATP World Tour Finals.
Two of them had qualified from Group Au00a0Del Potro and Federer, as it turned out with Murray edged out of the five-million-dollar tournament by the tightest of margins on an ATP statistics calculator.
"Anyone know what's going on? I think I'm audi (out) but the rules aren't worded too well," Murray wrote on his Twitter microblogging page.
With all three tied on matches won and percentage of sets won, it went down to games. The Briton won 44 out of 87 games played (50.57 percent), while Del Potro won 45 out of 88 (51.14 percent).
Federer, who won 44 out of 84, was relatively in the clear on 52.38 percent.
Murray had beaten Spain's Fernando Verdasco 6-4, 6-7 (4/7), 7-6 (7/3), which, barring Argentina's Del Potro first beating Swiss World No 1 Federer, doing it in three sets, and winning a certain number of games in the process, would have been enough to see him through. Del Potro defeated Federer 6-2, 6-7 (5/7), 6-3, with a final set that saw Federer through after having won one game, and at 3-3 Del Potro having to win it 6-3 to go through. "Sure, it's confusing. I asked Juan Martin at the net, Did you make it or not? He said, 'I don't think so'," said Federer.
Later Federer was in the locker room, "showering, stretching and stuff when I heard I was through."
Del Potro said his coach "told me I had qualified."
