Four months, fourteen miles and a change of surface separate Wimbledon from this week’s proceedings at the 02 Arena but not much seemed to have altered on Sunday for Andy Murray. Having played a strangely lacklustre match on his last appearance in London – the quarter final defeat to Grigor Dimitrov at SW19 – he lobbed in a similarly curious performance to open the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals. Except this one was even worse. Whereas the Bulgarian had excelled beyond himself on that summer afternoon Kei Nishikori did not even have to produce his best to win 6-4 6-4 and jeopardise Murray’s hopes for this week at the 02 Arena.
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Kei Nishikori deservedly won the first set against Andy Murray 6-4
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The Japanese raced into a 3-0 lead in the second, before Murray got to 4-4
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But Nishikori stifled any comeback from Murray, taking the second 6-4
@placeholder was there for the taking early on and could not a land a first serve in.