Murray maniacs left sweating for a while

By Martyn Herman

LONDON (Reuters) - Just for a while, a little-known American with a back to front baseball cap threatened to throw cold water all over Murray-Mania on a sizzling day at Wimbledon.

Robert Kendrick was supposed to provide nothing much more than a warm-up session for Andy Murray before the Scot moved on to sterner tests in his mission to become Britain's first men's singles champion here since before World War II.

After all, he had lost 6-0 6-0 to the world number three in one of their three previous meetings, all won by the Scot, and his form in the build-up to the grasscourt slam would hardly have caused Murray to wake up in a cold sweat.

In the end the Briton launched his assault on a maiden grand slam title with a 7-5 6-7 6-3 6-4 victory on Centre Court that was comfortable enough, without being particularly convincing.

Then again, 29-year-old Kendrick, who took Rafael Nadal to five sets here three years ago, played much better than his 76th ranking suggested, swaggering around like a Wild West gunslinger firing off unreturnable serves and scorching forehands.

When he stole the second-set tiebreak with a thunderbolt return off a weak second serve the match threatened to turn into the kind of gut-wrenching cliff-hanger served up by the former British darling of the Centre Court Tim Henman.

Henman, a beacon of middle England, once attracted legions of flag-waving fans on his runs to four Wimbledon semi-finals.

Murray's support is less predictable and there were numerous shouts of "C'mon Robert" throughout the match.