Former world number one, Andy Murray has announced that he would retire from tennis after the upcoming Paris Olympics. The British made the announcement through his social media page on Tuesday, with the caption “Arrived in Paris for my last ever tennis tournament”. He further added “Competing for Team GB has been by far the most memorable weeks of my career and I’m extremely proud to get to do it one final time!”
A two-time Olympic singles gold medalist and a mixed doubles silver medalist, Murray has had success representing his country, making it quite befitting that he would end his career at an Olympic tournament.
News of Murray’s retirement has been looming for years now, and a lot of people expect it to have happened earlier than now, particularly back in 2018 when a hip injury almost ended his career. At the start of the year, the 37-year-old spoke directly about a possible retirement and said it would happen soon. His recent years on the court has been fraught with injuries that have stiffened his performance, preventing him from making it to the quarterfinals of most events he has played in.
A three-time grand slam champion, Murray was often grouped with retired Swiss Roger Federer, Spanish veteran Rafael Nadal, and Serbian Novak Djokovic as ‘The Big Four. Although the title gap between him and the remaining three is quite wide, Murray, before the injuries, was as much of a fighter as them. Although he only won three grand slam titles, he played at the final six other times, where he lost to either Federer or Djokovic.
Regarded as British number one for many years, Murray’s career has more success stories, particularly in the early years. There is no telling how far he would have fared if he did not have the rest of The Big Four to compete with or was not plagued by so many injuries in recent years.
Till date, he remains the only male singles player to win back to back gold at the Olympics (London 2012 and Rio 2016). In Paris this year, he would be competing at the singles and doubles events before he says goodbye to the sports one last time.
