Murray swing gets a song

A Scottish fitness teacher who wrote a tribute song about Andy Murray was invited to Wimbledon on Friday by the world number two’s mother Judy and thanks to Centre Court’s roof he avoided singing in the rain.

Amateur musician Keith Meisner’s singing career suddenly took off when his fellow Scot shared the song “Under The Lights, Song for Andy Murray” with his 1.5 million social media followers.

Murray told his fans: “A friend of mine who I grew up playing tennis with came up with this song.”

That provoked an avalanche of interest with the song about the “Diamond of Dunblane” receiving more than 15,000 hits on YouTube in five days.

“The reaction has been really positive from the fans. It was really good of Andy,” said Meisner who used to travel together with Murray on the junior tour.

Meisner, who now works as a physical education teacher at a school in Aberdeenshire, northern Scotland, stopped playing tennis in 2005 just after Murray hit the headlines for reaching the third round at Wimbledon on his first appearance.

Meisner came close himself to appearing at Junior Wimbledon but fell just short in the rankings. “It’s a nice touch to be asked down to play the guitar and use more of my musical talents. I am really excited about it,” he said.

Meisner was inspired to write the song about Murray after watching him playing under the lights in New York and then facing the glare of camera flashes.

The chorus is “He’s got a game as sharp as a dagger. He’ll boom that backhand past you. He’s got a chess player’s mind and boxer’s feet. That’s a combination that is tough to beat.”