SIZZLING hot Andy Murray roared into his seventh successive final with a commanding victory over Canadian Milos Raonic at the Western & Southern Open in Cincinnati on Saturday.
Olympic champion Murray, who beat Raonic in the Wimbledon final, notched his career best 22nd consecutive win by blunting the fourth-seeded Canadian’s intimidating service game in a 6-3 6-3 semi-final victory.
Top seed Murray, gearing up for the U.S. Open in nine days, the last grand slam of the year, will face either former U.S. Open winner Marin Cilic of Croatia or Grigor Dimitrov of Bulgaria.
Heavy rain fell just before the scheduled start of the semi-final and then four points into it there was a delay for a few minutes due to some heavy misting.
Raonic seemed off rhythm from the start, double-faulting twice as the Scot registered a break in the opening game.
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Murray said: “He served a couple of doubles that first game and I managed to get the break, and then had the momentum from there.”
Two-times Cincinnati winner Murray, playing with energy and excellence from sideline to sideline, broke Raonic again in the ninth game to close out the first set.
The second set went on serve until the eighth game, when Raonic committed another double fault, elected not to volley a lob that fell well within the baseline and netted a forehand on break point, one of his 31 unforced errors.
Murray had a touch of trouble closing out the match as he miss-hit a couple of shots and a light drizzle held up play again for a few minutes before the Briton executed a splendid drop volley to end it on his third match point.
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