Second seed Andy Murray wasted no time getting down to business on Thursday against No. 13 seed and local favourite Lucas Pouille at the BNP Paribas Masters, giving the Parisian crowd no chance to get involved as he convincingly advanced to the quarter-finals, 6-3, 6-0.
With the win, Murray remains in contention to unseat Novak Djokovic as World No. 1. The Brit must either win the title in Paris and have Djokovic lose before the final, or reach the final and have Djokovic lose before the semi-finals. The Serbian also moved into the quarter-finals with a three-set win over No. 14 seed Grigor Dimitrov.
“I thought I returned well today. I had chances in almost all of his service games during the match,” said Murray. “Obviously that’s good when the surface is a bit quicker. I was getting a good hit on them and rushing him immediately.”
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Next up for Murray is the winner of the match between seventh seed Tomas Berdych and Gilles Simon. Murray leads his FedEx ATP Head2Head rivalry over Berdych 9-5, but has prevailed in their past five matches, including two wins this year in Madrid and Wimbledon. The World No. 2 holds a dominant 16-2 record over Simon in their FedEx ATP Head2Head series, including three victories this year in Madrid, Shanghai and Vienna.
“I’ve played Simon a few times in the past few weeks and they’re hard matches, physically tough, a lot of long rallies,” said Murray. “Whereas with Berdych, it’s a power game and much shorter points. Very different players.”
Murray broke Pouille in the second game of the match and never lost his lead in the contest. From 4-3 in the first set, he went on an eight-game run to race to victory in one hour and 12 minutes. He improves his FedEx ATP Head2Head record against Pouille to 3-0, dropping just 10 games total in their three matches.
