Andy Murray Sweeps Past Ernests Gulbis at Wimbledon 2009

World No3 Andy Murray produced an excellent display to beat his second-round opponent Ernests Gulbis of Latvia in three straightforward sets.

The match promised to be a tricky encounter. Gulbis is a luminously talented 20-year-old who climbed to 38 in the world rankings as recently as last August, and on his day, an enormous serve combined with some devastating ground strokes can trouble any player in the world.

Thankfully for Murray, he took a little under 90 minutes to dispatch the man who has slipped to world No74 in recent months.

After a tight opening four games which the players shared, Murray took the following four and the first set which was over in 25 minutes.

Gulbis found his serve in the second set, and his most potent weapon took him to a share of the opening games, with Murray eventually finding a way to break only in the final game, when at 5-6 down, Gulbis made errors as Murray tested his patience.

The final set was even more routine for Murray, who broke Gulbis once again in the third game, and holding his own serve with ease, he took the set 6-3.

The Scot sealed victory with a superb forehand cross court winner after one hour and 28 minutes to the delight of a Center Court crowd. He will face either Serbia's Viktor Troicki or Spain's Daniel Gimeno Traver for a place in the fourth round, and said he is confident of making further progress if he can maintain the standard on serve.

"He had a couple of chances on my serve early on but didn't take them and I relaxed after that," said Murray. "I served the whole match great, I served really well, didn't give him many opportunities at all, used my slice backhand well - the variety was very good today - it's a lot better than my first match.

"It's a different kind of match (from the first round), Kendrick was serve-volleying, playing very aggressive and he loves playing on grass so he didn't struggle with the slice backhand so much. Today I definitely served better, made more returns in the court. I felt very comfortable. If I serve like that for the rest of the tournament, I've got a good chance of doing well."