Murray beaten by Mayer at Qatar Open
Andy Murray of Great Britain returns the ball to Florian Mayer of Germany during the Qatar ATP Open Tennis tournament in Doha, Qatar, Wednesday, Jan. 1, 2014. AP
DOHA, Qatar — Third-seeded Andy Murray, playing in his first tournament since back surgery in late September, was upset by Florian Mayer of Germany 3-6, 6-4, 6-2 in the second round of the Qatar Open on Wednesday.
Top-ranked Rafael Nadal was also taken to three sets but emerged with a 6-3, 6-7 (3), 6-3 win over Tobias Kamke of Germany, while second-seeded David Ferrer joined Murray in making an early exit after a 6-4, 7-5 loss to Daniel Brands of Germany.
Murray was leading 6-3, 3-0 when the 40th-ranked Mayer started to play more aggressively, going for winners on nearly every shot. The German won 12 of the last 15 games, closing out the match with a net-cord winner to seal the win in 1 hour, 51 minutes.
Murray hit 25 winners, but the reigning Wimbledon champion also had 37 unforced errors.
“I didn’t have extremely high expectations, because I haven’t obviously played a match for a long time,” Murray said. “You don’t know exactly how your body is going to respond.”
The last four times Murray played a tournament during the first week of the new season he captured the title: in 2008 and ’09 at Doha, and 2012 and ’13 at Brisbane.
Nadal trailed 4-1 in the second set but bounced back to level it at 4-4 before Kamke dominated the tiebreaker, taking a 5-0 lead.
Nadal earned three breaks in the match — one in each set — and each time Kamke double-faulted on break point.
“Important win,” said Nadal, who next faces seventh-seeded Ernests Gulbis of Latvia. “I spent a lot of time on court, so that’s important for my preparation, too.”
Gael Monfils upset fellow Frenchman and defending champion Richard Gasquet 6-2, 7-5 in the final match of the night. The fifth-seeded Gasquet has been dealing with a back problem this week.
Two other seeded players, No. 6 Philipp Kohlschreiber and No. 8 Fernando Verdasco, were also eliminated.
Kohschreiber fell to qualifier and fellow German Peter Gojowczyk 7-6 (4), 7-6 (7), while Verdasco lost to Victor Hanescu of Romania 4-6, 7-6 (0), 6-2.
