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Andy Murray avoided a 'double bagel' humiliation by Roger Federer at the ATP Tour finals on Thursday but conceded that even if he had played well he would not have lived with the “exceptional” brilliance of the Swiss.
To his credit, the Briton was a model of grace in defeat as he accepted the 6-0, 6-1 thumping at the O2 Arena, which brought a swift and brutal end to his season, had been carried out by a 33-year-old playing as if in his matchless 20-something pomp.
“He played exceptionally well, that’s for sure,” said Murray, pondering the 55-minute thrashing in which he was so completely outplayed that he won 24 of the 78 points contested.
“I can say I'm disappointed with my level but if I played well, he probably still would have won anyway.
“After the first few games of the match, he played exceptionally well, made very few mistakes, was hitting the ball off the middle of the racquet on serve and returns.
“I would have obviously hoped to have done a lot better than that but when he's extremely loose like he was tonight -- he was obviously (already) through in the group -- he was able to maybe try some shots that he might not try in other situations.
“But everything he tried came off. He has the ability to do that.”
It was impossible not to sympathise with Murray, who reckoned he tried to give everything from the first shot to the last to provide the 18,000 capacity crowd, largely on his side, with a match to remember in a week of one-sided fare.
For the twice Grand Slam champion, though, this nearly turned into a match to remember for all the wrong reasons as the Scot found himself, at 6-0 5-0 and 30-0 down, just two points away from the ultimate embarrassment.
“Obviously, six-love, six-love, I mean, that's never happened to me in my career,” said Murray. “Six-love, six-one has maybe happened only once to me before, so it's very disappointing.”
The 6-1, 6-0 defeat was by Novak Djokovic in the semi-final in Miami in 2007 but, as Murray pointed out, he had been slightly injured that day. How could he describe the experience of being steamrollered like this?
“I would say it’s ‘frustrating’. That would be the one word to describe it. There’s some matches where you might have behaved badly or felt like you hadn’t given your best effort but I was trying tonight.
"So it’s very frustrating when you’re trying to give your best," he added.