Davis Cup final: Murray seals British win

Sunday also was Murray’s eighth singles victory in a year’s Davis Cup play, tying the record of John McEnroe in 1982 and Mats Wilander in ’83.

The third match was a doubles encounter played by the Murray brothers, Andy and Jamie vs Belgium’s David Goffin and Steve Darcis.

“Andy’s performance was staggering, to go up against this crowd and to win in three straight sets – it’s just tremendous”.

Murray joins the rest of his Big Four members (Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal) with a Davis Cup.

It’s the 10th win all time for the Brits, which is third most in history, odd given the 78-year break. “I imagine we’ll have a party tonight”.

British tennis, for so long the punchline to gags about national sporting ineptitude, has recovered its pride after Andy Murray hauled a rejuvenated team to the altogether unlikely heights of its first Davis Cup triumph since 1936.

World number two Murray, whose return to the team in 2013 accelerated Britain’s rapid rise from the depths that begun when Smith took charge in 2010, has won 11 live rubbers in this year’s run, matching Ivan Ljubicic’s total for Croatia in 2005.

Goffin, ranked No. 16, had not won a set against Murray in two previous matches on the tour.

“I wasn’t thinking about the year as a whole, literally just that moment when you hit the winning shot and win the match”.

Murray broke twice in the final three games to close out the 6-3, 7-5, 6-3 win.

Within seconds, his jubilant fellow players and coaches rushed to embrace him.

Murray won all of his 11 Davis Cup matches over the course of a year. Murray was then hoisted up by his teammates in celebration of their win. With both break and match point at 30-40 on the Goffin serve, the two became involved in a lengthy rally which looked to have climaxed when Goffin played a stunning victor down the line. “It is incredible that we managed to win this competition”.

“It feels unbelievable”, Murray said courtside against a backdrop of rolling tumult.

After Smith batted away a question about a knighthood for arguably Scotland’s greatest ever sportsman, Murray was playfully asked if it should be ‘Arise, Sir Leon’.

While much of the adulation focused on Murray, a few pundits were careful to heap praise on Britain’s Davis Cup team, which included Murray’s brother, Jamie.

It was, he admitted, the most emotional he had been after any of his famous victories, and he suggested not even another Grand Slam title would eclipse the experience.

Goffin squandered a break point at 2-2 in the opening set and his opponent then pounced, scorching a backhand victor off a weak second serve to take a lead he never relinquished.