I had my doubts with the recent Wimbledon winner, even with his tenacious spirit and somewhat surreal defensive abilities, it had been a year since his last proper match. But you never know with champions, judging by how Roger Federer came back from injury in late 2016, he went on to win the Australian Open in early 2017 and Wimbledon in the summer so you never can tell how big players are going to react in their first game back.

Unlike Federer who blazes his way past opponents with aggressive flat hitting and therefore can afford himself a bit of rustiness in terms of fitness and movement on the court Murray is much more of a defensive player, covers so much more ground and so his comeback was never going to be as easy as Federers in terms of physical demand. Murray tries to outwit his opponents whilst demoralising them with lengthy rallies always trying to get the opponent to play one more frustrating shot to win every single point and inevitably this sort of dogged play takes its toll over many years.

He was also up against an opponent with weapons capable of almost toppling Federer this week at Stuttgart. Indeed in that game if Kyrgios had just kept his aggressive serve percentage up until the final tie break end he would have come through against Federer having been a mini break up early on in that last set tie break. So this game was no easy match for Murray on his return. Still Murray would have been buoyed by what was a packed out crowd at Queens eagerly keen to get a glimpse of the two time Wimbledon champ on his return.

But in the first set it looked like it was just going to be a walk in the park for Murray as Kyrgios just hadn’t turned up to the races. Mid way through the first set after a fair bit of sulking Kyrgios started to hand Murray some break points with some overly aggressive second serves and some stupidly hard hit shots flying comfortable out. Murray broke Kyrgios twice in the first set. Kyrgios can be so temperamental, incredibly temperamental actually at times and for no good reason too. But that’s also what makes him such a danger, because when he switches on Kyrgios has the potential to wipe the floor with most players on the tennis court perhaps setting aside Federer and Nadal. So after a 6-2 first set start for Murray it looked inevitable his return would be perfect.

Back came Kyrgios in the second set with the early break and then after Murray recovered Kyrgios squeezed past him in the tie break hitting some solid ground stroke winners which would give Murray a few jitters in the third.

The last set looked a little bit suspect for Murray starting from early on. He was holding his bottom left part of his back many times as Kyrgios was making him really work for any sniff of a break on his serve. At the same time you couldn’t help admire the sheer conviction and effort Murray was putting into every point, you wouldn't have thought he was just returning from injury with the way he was treating the match. Perhaps this is part of the reason why hes a champion but also why he’s had such as bad injury, he never knows when to stop running and nothing is a lost cause.

Murray's slice was keeping him contention mid way through the third set, it has always been one of his best shots and it was keeping him in the mix with Kygrios who was holding his service games far more comfortably and quickly. This coupled with some scrappy defensive play and the odd drop shot looked like it was actually beginning to wear Kyrgios down physically and allowed Murray to square it at 3-3. Most people at this point would have probably called a tie break as inevitable.

But 3 games later and we suddenly had a far more intense and dramatic game. At 5-4 to Kyrgios, Murray had to save a series of match points against on his serve. One of which was a relentless game of who would blink first as Murray peppered the Kyrgios forehand with heavy loaded top spin shots with Kyrgios replying with defensive slices almost daring Murray to miss. Eventually Murray held the game much to the relief of him and the crowd.

After failing to break Kyrgios again in the next game Murray was forced to try hold serve a final game before a tie break could be played. To be fair a tie break was probably deserved for both players who were equally matched throughout the entire three sets. So it was very unfortunate that on the final two points of Murray' serve he first overcooked what looked like a fairly standard one two punch service point on his forehand before double faulting to gift Kyrgios the match.

So what was the difference between the two players overall other than the glaringly obvious lack of match fitness from Murray? Nicks serve that’s what. Kyrgios can fire second serve aces down out of nowhere to get himself out of some shaky games and that’s what he did in his final service game before Murray stumbled out of Queens. Interestingly enough its the points Kyrgios comes up with the aces on which is so key, Murray had equalled Nick for aces in this match, but Nicks came at the decisive moments.

I think desirably Murray would have liked to have had the opportunity to play a few more rounds at Queens to test his hip injury, fitness and just to get some match play under his belt before Wimbledon. Now he will go into Wimbledon with a big question mark over his head for both match fitness and form.