Andy Murray wins Wimbledon

Andy Murray etched his name even further into British sporting history when he joined the true elite of tennis by winning a second Wimbledon title.

From the overnight queuers to the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, the Centre Court rose to acclaim the 29-year-old Scot as defused the power of 6ft 5in Canadian Milos Raonic to win 6-4 7-6 7-6.

He became only the 12th man in the Open Era to win Wimbledon twice, adding it to his US Open and Olympic gold medal among other honours.

Murray was the master craftsman, returning his opponent's massive serve with his electric reflexes and stopping him becoming the first Canadian to win a Major.

Raonic never gave up but was defeated by an absolute masterclass from Murray, whose backhand was a wonder and who made, incredibly, only one unforced error on his forehand the whole afternoon.

The Canadian never gave up until the last forehand winner ensured there would be no drama like in the close of his last Wimbledon win against Novak Djokovic. Murray sat down, sobbing at his chair.

It became apparent early on that Raonic was not going to be overwhelmed on his Grand Slam final debut and the improvement in his net play was evident from the start.

But Murray had the first chance, at 1-1, creating a break point that Raonic saved with angled forehand. The blustery wind and sun was causing Murray problems with his ball toss but his serve was untroubled, while he was managing to get plenty of the Canadian's thunderbolts back.

At 3-3 he created two more break points and executed the second one with a huge forehand that brought a volleying error from Raonic, padding it into the net and paying the price for missing the first serve on each of the three chances.

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Murray closed out the set and then had a huge chance in the first game with Raonic serving at the trickier non-Royal Box end. He had another break point after returning at 140mph first serve but could only thrash a forehand into the net.

Steadily the Canadian seemed to be getting more comfortable but still the chances came for Murray, usually created by his backhand and outstanding backhand return of serve, as Raonic tried more and more to serve straight at his body.

He missed one at 3-3 off a second serve and then forced two more at 4-4. He missed one with a criminal backhand slice into the net and the other with a forehand in the net, tightening up at the crucial time.

That made the tiebreak even more impressive, as Murray will have been eaten up inside at his failure to take those precious opportunities.

Raonic started the tiebreak poorly by netting a simple backhand, while Murray responded by landing in his first serve on the next two points. When he hit a wonderfully disguised backhand down the line for 5-1 the tiebreak was effectively over and the Scot served it out for 7-3.

He had not faced a break point while restricting the Canadian to just four aces and only one in four unreturned serves – way below his average.

Murray also emerged with the advantage of serving first in the second set but he was the first to get in trouble, needing to save two break points at 2-2. Time and again he profited from dipping ball low over the net when Raonic approached.

A major difference between the two players was the prowess of their backhands, but the Canadian was not backing down in the face of Murray's almost error-free assault.

He forced a second tiebreak with the opportunity of shifting the momentum quite dramatically. Murray got his first serves in and returned exquisitely to race to 5-0 before closing it out 7-2.

He earned £2million for this, but that will seem incidental.

'It's the most important tournament for me every year. I've had some tough losses here so I'm very proud to have my hands on the trophy again,' said Murray. 'I played some really good stuff today but Milos has had a great few weeks on the grass and some unbelievable wins.'

Murray could not resist poking fun at his restored mentor Ivan Lendl, who almost broke a smile and even looked vaguely emotional at the end: 'He's just lucky. But a big thank you to all my team for their hard work.

'I'm going to make sure I enjoy this. I was just so relieved last time and there was so much stress that I didn't really get the chance to enjoy it but I will enjoy this tonight.'

Raonic is likely to trouble the scorers again here and said: 'It's a difficult challenge, Andy has been playing great and he deserves to be winning here. It's been a great few weeks and there's nothing I want more than to be back here.'