NEW YORK—With Novak Djokovic up a set in his exhibition match with Andy Murray at Madison Square Garden last night, the two men met at the center-strap of the net after the changeover. They whipped out their cellphones and, imitating Ellen DeGeneres’ act from the previous evening’s festivities at the Oscars, took selfies with their arms around each others’ shoulders, and the crowd (nearly 16,000 in attendance) in the background.
It was standard fare that the crowd at an exo laps up. Besides, neither man had ever set foot inside MSG before this night, and the mythology—much of it nakedly and shamelessly self-perpetuating, like all things New York—had left an impression.
A wag, though, might have thought those selfies were destined to go on the side of a milk carton, as both Grand Slam champions have essentially been missing in action thus far this year. Djokovic will be heading to the desert for the Indian Wells Masters without a title to his name in the third month of the year, the first time that’s happened since 2006. And Murray, who’s recovering from minor back surgery he underwent last fall, has yet to reach a final—his best effort was a semifinal in Acapulco last week.
Both men are in need of a few good wins, and they played like it last night.
It was a tough night for those who are certain that exhibition matches are fixed in order to please the crowd and prolong the action. They were doomed to second-guess the authenticity of every errant second serve and every mangled break point. When Murray broke Djokovic to go up 5-3 in the second set, suspicious minds leaped to work—Aha! The fix is in! We’re going three!
Whoops. Djokovic broke right back, in a game prolonged by an unexpected guest appearance by Wimbledon champ and now retiree Marion Bartoli.
Ms. Bartoli popped out of the courtside seats, and immediately began to disrobe; she was just getting into something more comfortable—for tennis. This took quite some time, as Maid Marion, never an ascetic, seems to be living the good life. When she went on court, Murray promptly whistled a serve past her while she stood rooted in her signature pose, with both hands on the racquet handle. If she tried to hop around like in the good old days, it wasn’t obvious.
Murray turned the heat down a bit and served a ball that Bartoli did return, and they engaged in a long and entertaining rally that took the crowd by surprise. That’s because the vast majority of the onlookers had no idea who Bartoli is, or what she so recently accomplished.
When Bartoli smacked a crisp backhand return, the fans issued a collective sigh of approval. With each passing stroke, and it was a long and entertaining rally, their amazement grew more voluble as they turned to each other, asking, “Who is that girl? Where did they get her?” When the rally ended, the Jumbotron high above the court cleared up the mystery of her identity. Djokovic gave her a big hug as he escorted her off the court and he then proceeded to break Murray, to stay even on serve.
Djokovic would go on to win the tiebreaker, 7-2, to end the BNP Paribas Showdown in straights—and flummox the conspiracy theorists. So let’s walk through this one more time, for these days this appears to be how it works: