I think it's fair to say Andy Murray hasn't exactly enjoyed his time at the Miami Open this week and his tournament came to an abrupt halt with a three sets defeat to Grigor Dimitrov.
During his victory over Denis Istomin he vented his frustration over being handed a women's ball and was picked up courtside microphones saying: ''That's one of the women's balls and I could have hit a shot with it.''
He further complained to umpire, Mohamed Lahyani, saying: ''For me that's not good enough, it's unacceptable. Unacceptable to have one of those balls in there.''
The ball used in the women's tour is lighter and uses "regular-duty felt" as opposed to the men's who use "extra-duty". The lighter ball is said to slow faster in the air and would mean in practical terms that he would have less control over his shots.
He said after beating Istomin: "I was a bit frustrated because I’d just missed two balls long, and I didn’t know if that was one of the balls that I’d used in the last couple of points."
The latest event he can have no such complaints. During the second set of his defeat to Grigor Dimitrov, Murray lost his cool and took it out on his equipment bag:
@andy_murray racket smash. 3x plus more is bad.#tennisgifs pic.twitter.com/ncN71Htze6
— Tennis Captions (@tenniscaptions) March 29, 2016
The Scot denies any rift with coach Amelie Mauresmo and considering the media attention he has courted over the course of the tournament, he may be happy to see the back of the Miami Open.
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