Top seed Andy Murray takes on unseeded Tunisian tennis player Malek Jaziri in the opening round of the ongoing Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships 2017.
The world number one is taking to the court for the singles tie, first time after his shock fourth-round defeat to Mischa Zverev at last month's Australian Open. Murray lost a bit of training time ahead of the ATP 500 tournament as well as he recovered from Shingles only recently.
Murray heads into the Men's singles first-round match shortly after losing his doubles opening round along with Nenad Zimonjic against Dan Evans and Gilles Muller in straight sets on Monday.
The top seed, who had a stunning season in 2016 in which he rose to the top of the ATP rankings ladder, has been without a title so far as he failed to cross the final hurdle in Doha, losing the title match in three sets to world number two Novak Djokovic, following which he suffered an early exit in Melbourne. He would thus be itching to get his first title of 2017 and the hard courts in Dubai provide him with a perfect platform.
While he is likely to meet third seed Roger Federer, against whom he lost the final in 2012, in the semi-final, Murray has not faced his Tuesday's opponent, Jaziri, before. The world number 49, who has not had a solid start to the new season, is unlikely to test the number one player later today.
Jaziri has been busy this season but he has not progressed past the third round in any of the five tournaments he has played this year. The Tunisian is heading to Dubai on the back of second-round exits at Montpellier and Marseille as well.
TV Schedule
US: beiN Sports
Australia: beIN Sports
UK: BT Sport
India: Sony ESPN
Thailand: Truevision
Dubai: OSN Channel 681
China: Iqiyi
Malaysia: Astro Supersport
Japan: DAZN
Middle East: beIN Sports
