Novak Djokovic hails Andy Murray’s ‘victory for Britain’

Novak Djokovic has praised Andy Murray after the Scot beat him in straight sets to be crowned Wimbledon men’s singles winner.

The world No 1 from Serbia was at the wrong end of a straight sets, who won 6-4 7-5 6-4 in just over three hours.

Djokovic was gracious in defeat, saying: “He deserved to win and that’s it.

“It must mean a lot to everybody. Wimbledon is the most important tennis tournament in the world.

“Especially for him as a British player and crowd, it couldn’t be a more perfect setting for them.

“It was a very long match for three sets. The bottom line is that he was a better player in decisive moments.

“Both second and third sets, I was 4-2 up and dropped the serve in those games and just allowed him to come back for no reason.

“He was getting some incredible shots on the stretch and running down the drop shots. He was all over the court.

“He played fantastic tennis, no question about it. He deserved to win. I should have played better in the decisive moments.

“I believed I could come back. I really fought. It wasn’t my day.

“I didn’t play on the top of my abilities, and with this kind of game I didn’t have a chance to win.”

Djokovic was indeed strangely off the boil. His game lacked organisation, his serving was poor and he produced 40 unforced errors – almost double that of Murray.

“It’s a very high level of tennis that we competed at today,” Djokovic said. “I knew I had to be on top of my game in order to prevail in this match.

“He had a huge motivation to win his first title. I also had a lot of motivation.

“It was a long opening six, seven games. It went almost 40 minutes.

“I wasn’t patient enough in the moments when I should have been, when I should have looked for the better opportunity to attack, and my serve wasn’t as good as it was the whole tournament.

“But also that is because he’s such a good returner. When I was putting my first serves in he was always getting them back in the court and making me play an extra shot. That’s why he won this tournament.”