Jamie Murray into semi-finals of men's doubles and mixed doubles final at Flushing Meadows
Thursday 5 September 2019 11:48, UK
There might yet be British champions at the US Open.
After a slow start to their partnership Jamie Murray and Neal Skupski are forming a formidable team, moving two wins away from the men's doubles title at Flushing Meadows.
From the brink of defeat in the quarter-finals, they rallied from 2-5 in the final set against American duo Jack Sock and Jackson Withrow to advance to the last four on Wednesday.
"Not saying we deserved to win more than them, but for us, for just the fight and the effort, the training we've done over the past few weeks, we got our payback for that," Murray said.
Murray joined forces with fellow Brit Skupski ahead of the grass-court campaign, following a decline in form with former partner Bruno Soares, with whom he won two Grand Slam titles and reached world No 1.
The Scot admitted at the time the decision to split with the Brazilian was his own and "had to be done".
The initial signs for Murray and Skupski, who had previously played with his brother Ken, struggled on the grass courts, suffering early exits at Hertogenbosch and Queen's before exiting Wimbledon in the first round.
Murray then reunited with his brother Andy for the first time since September 2016 at the Citi Open in Washington.
What has followed is an impressive run of results, which has seen the pair reach the semi-finals in three straight tournaments - Cincinnati, Winston-Salem and now at Flushing Meadows.
"Obviously it didn't go too well on the grass… we didn't spend much time after the grass," Skupski told the ATP website.
"I played World Team Tennis for three weeks and Jamie played a week with Andy in Washington. And then we played Montreal together, we practised once before the match.
"We went to Cincinnati and we had a lot of days to work and practise. We put a lot of things together and I think from then it worked really well.
"We got a lot of matches in Cincinnati… we've come into the US Open with a lot of confidence and we're in the semi-finals now and we've got to just take it one match at a time."
Murray and Skupski will play top seeds and Wimbledon champions Juan Sebastian Cabal and Robert Farah on Thursday for a spot in the final.
But this is not the only success Murray, who is one of nine British players to have played in the men's doubles, is enjoying in New York this fortnight.
The 33-year-old won two matches in a day on Wednesday to also reach the final of the mixed doubles alongside American Bethanie Mattek-Sands.
"We were on fire," said Murray, after a straight-sets win against third seeds Sam Stosur and Rajeev Ram.
"We didn't give them a chance, I'm really happy to be in the final again."
The defending champions, who needed a wildcard after Mattek-Sands missed almost five months of the season with complications in her right knee, will need to defeat top seeds Chan Hao-Ching and Michael Venus in the final to repeat last year's title.
Victory would also mean a third straight US Open success in mixed doubles, after winning alongside Martina Hingis in 2017.
Murray is closing on a third men's doubles Grand Slam title - first since the 2016 US Open - and a fifth success in mixed doubles.
Form is temporary, class is permanent.
