Wellington, Aug 28(ANI): British tennis star Andy Murray has said players were unified in their drive for a bigger percentage of revenue from major championships, but hoped a strike would fail to materialise, as it would damage the sport.
Murray triumphed over cramps, inconsistent serving, unforced errors and windy conditions to defeat Russian Alex Bogomolov 6-2 6-4 6-1 in the first round of the US Open.
Strike action was first proposed at a frenzied player meeting before the Australian Open in January that led to a public rift between Rafael Nadal and world No 1 Roger Federer.
Nadal, an 11-time Grand Slam champion afterward quit his role on the players' council, following his public feud with Federer.
"Who knows what is going to happen. I hope it doesn't come down to that. That's bad for everybody, really," Stuff.co.nz quoted Murray, as saying.
"When we went through the player meeting at the Aussie Open, it was pretty brutal. Everyone was speaking up. The whole tour was kind of together. They still are. The majority of players want to see a change in the grand slams," he added.
Murray refused to talk about the likelihood of a strike.
"Have no idea. There's so many things that go into something like that with lawyers, forming unions, all sorts of different scenarios that need to be thought through first. Right now it's a long way away, but I don't know how serious everybody is about it," Murray said.
"If in the next month or two months they get everything sorted and ready to go then I'll have a better answer at that time," he added.
Murray would face Croatian Ivan Dodig in the second round. (ANI)
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