Andy Murray Wimbledon: Lu plays down upset chances

REALISTICALLY, Yen-hsun Lu has no chance of beating Andy Murray in this afternoon’s second-round match. Everyone says so – including Yen-hsun Lu himself.

Lu Yen-Hsun of Taipei. Picture: Getty

There may be a tradition in professional sport of talking up your own chances, but the Taiwanese player sees no need to follow it. Instead, he seems content merely to be competitive against the Olympic and US Open champion.

“It will be a very tough one for me,” said Lu, who beat Murray’s fellow Briton James Ward in the first round. “I mean, especially now he just winning Queen’s, and also he’s No 2 in the world. I mean, I’m really happy I have a second round and play the good players.

“I’ll just try to bring my best performance against him. If you’re asking me right now do I expect to beat him, I say not. But for me, I just try to do my best and challenge him. That’s what I can do in the match.”

You might think that Lu’s intention was to lessen the pressure on himself and increase the burden on Murray, but he went on to admit that the Scot was actually pretty good at dealing with the increasing expectation on him. “He has handled that, because he has already done it in the Olympics,” he said.

“For sure everybody has a lot of extra pressure from their home crowd, but I think he has done it, so there is no question that he can’t do it again. I really respect him: he is a great player.

“I just try to enjoy it. Maybe the score that comes in won’t be so good, but I know that I will try my best.”

Lu already has the edge over many other of Murray’s more lowly ranked opponents as he has previously chalked up a win against the No 2 seed, in the Beijing Olympics. But he would do no more than concede that the memory of that shock result from 2008 gave him a little bit of confidence.

“This is already past for five years. After I have retired I can start to remember back to this victory, but for me I have to face the match and face these three sets.

“Of course this victory maybe gives me a little bit of confidence, even if it was five years ago. He is a great player. Everyone knows he has improved so much in this one year – the final at Wimbledon, the Olympics, the US Open, even Australia Open he played fantastic matches.

“I don’t say he is the No 1, but he can say that and no-one will question that.”