Andy Murray match paused as climate protestors throw large balls onto court

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Andy Murray’s match with American star Taylor Fritz was paused for five-and-a-half minutes as climate protestors threw oversized custom tennis balls onto the court at the Citi Open. Those disruptors were taken away by police as the two players were made to wait to resume the first set of their last 16 tie.

There was a banner in the stand urging people to stop using fossil fuels and to fight climate change, while large balls were thrown onto the court as Murray was attempting to serve.

Murray and Fritz took their seats as they waited for the protestors to be ushered out of the arena, in an already eventful match as the 36-year-old Brit smashed his racket into the floor as his frustrations were evident having gone down early to Fritz.

It is not thought to be the actions of Just Stop Oil, who last month infiltrated Wimbledon and threw orange confetti and jigsaw pieces onto the outside courts as part of their continued protests.

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Murray would have been keen to avoid a lengthy first set that was halted further by the protests, as he faces the prospect of playing twice in one day after his match with Fritz was initially postponed from Thursday to Friday.

Fritz and Murray played for over an hour before the first set was decided, but adverse weather conditions on Thursday saw outside play cancelled and the decision-makers have been forced to cram the winner of Murray vs Fritz and the victor of Christopher Eubanks and Jordan Thompson into the same day as their last 16 matches.

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Murray has been stepping up his conditioning ahead of the hardcourt season in preparation for the US Open with a “brutal” new training regime in the hopes that can be the edge in long matches. “I mean, I got here pretty early,” he said ahead of the tournament. “We arrived on Tuesday night, so yeah, try and get used to the humidity.

“Obviously I had quite a lot of issues last year during American summer with cramping and stuff like that. I wanted to make sure I got here early to give myself enough time to adjust to that. It’s been good.

“So in preparation I was doing a lot of bike sessions. I put the bike in there and we can open the steam room a little bit to increase the humidity – obviously [turn on] the heaters to get the heat in the room up. Set it to like 35 degrees celsius and, like, 70 per cent humidity and then I would do my bike sessions in there.”

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