• Indian Wells

Murray's run ended by Raonic

Andy Murray started well, but Milos Raonic shifted up a gear from the second set © Getty Images

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Andy Murray's drought in the desert continues following a 6-4 5-7 3-6 defeat to Canadian 10th seed Milos Raonic at Indian Wells.

Murray, who has won just eight matches in total in the Californian event on his last five visits, failed to capitalise on a good start as he cruised through the opening set with just three unforced errors to his opponent's 16.

It was the young Canadian's first win over a top-10 player since September.

Raonic fired 15 aces and held triple match point when he ripped a crosscourt forehand to close out the win after breaking Murray three times in the final set.

"The third set was just a bad, bad set of tennis," Murray, who broke Raonic to lead 2-1 before losing five of the final six games, said.

Murray, ranked sixth in the world, struggled in all three of his matches at Indian Wells. He rallied from a set down to beat Lukas Rosol and Jiri Vesely, but couldn't overcome Raonic's power.

"He obviously wins a lot of free points with his serve," Murray added. "So over the course of the set, if you give up enough unforced errors on basic shots, then with the amount of free points he gets on his serve, that's going to add up to a negative result."

Raonic blew his first match point when he returned Murray's serve long. Murray held to trail 5-3, but Raonic held at love to close out the match. He hit 42 winners to 22 for Murray.

Playing his first tournament since injuring his left ankle at the Australian Open in January, Raonic hadn't beaten someone in the top 10 since defeating then-No.6 Tomas Berdych in the Bangkok final in autumn.

Raonic, a 23-year-old ranked 11th in the world, advanced to the quarter-finals against Rafael Nadal's conqueror Alexandr Dolgopolov, who beat Fabio Fognini 6-2 6-4.

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