Andy Murray baffled after one of the WORST misses of his career in defeat by Andrea Vavassori

Andy Murray’s current lack of clear direction was summed up by surely one of the worst misses of his career as he suffered a fourth straight defeat.

The twice Wimbledon champion admitted that he ‘butchered’ the simplest of volleys at 6-6 in the tiebreak en route to going down 6-2, 7-6 against world No 164 Andrea Vavassori in the first round of the Madrid Open.

Murray was looking poised to stage one of his famous comebacks, having saved three match points, but his touch deserted him when he was faced with a backhand put-away that seemed almost impossible to mess up.

Having started the season so promisingly in Australia he is now scrambling for form, and not entirely sure whether should stay on the clay and play the French Open, with the grass his continuing priority.

He admitted to being baffled at his glaring miss in the tiebreak that would have seen him gain a set point: ‘Everyone misses bad shots throughout their career, but I don’t have too many like that,’ said the 35 year-old Scot. ‘That’s a frustrating thing because you construct the point well, play the right way, and then just butcher the basic shot.’

Murray stated that he still wanted to play the French Open next month, but admitted that there were differences of opinion among his team about whether that was the right course of action.

‘I would like to play (Paris), just purely because I don’t know if I’ll get another opportunity to play again. Whilst I feel fit and healthy I would like to give it a go. I also have ambitions of competing for Wimbledon titles. I know that sitting here today that probably doesn’t sound realistic, but I do believe that that’s a possibility. I obviously want to do the right thing there.

‘The experiences I have had when I have won Wimbledon have been in 2013 when I didn’t play the French Open, and 2016 I had my best French Open and then won Wimbledon. It didn’t have an impact necessarily.’

In temperatures that were nudging the nineties the conditions at Madrid’s altitude were extremely lively, and Murray found it tough to handle the huge serve of the unheralded Italian.

After a sluggish start which saw him go down 4-0 he did get back into it with a break back in the second set, and the comeback looked on as be began to play better. 

But several volleying errors in the tiebreak cost him dearly, and Murray is now without a win since early March at Indian Wells.

Earlier Kyle Edmund, again using one of his protected ranking entries to play, made a promising start against former US Open champion Dominic Thiem, but two double faults at 4-4 saw him lose momentum and eventually the match 6-4, 6-1.