‘I don’t know what people have against the Brits’ - Cameron Norrie's shoes missing before biggest win of his life

ByFreddie Clayton

Updated 18/10/2021 at 12:43 GMT

For the second time at Indian Wells, a British player´s shoes went missing. After Andy Murray lost - and recovered - his shoes with his wedding ring attached to the laces, Cameron Norrie suffered a similar fate, losing his shoes just ahead of the most important final of his life. Fortunately, he won the final, but his shoes remain a mystery.

Cameron Norrie has said his shoes went missing ahead of the biggest match of his life, but that didn't stop the new British number one from winning his first ATP Masters 1000 title.

Norrie, 26, fought back from a set down to win 3-6, 6-4, 6-1 against Georgian Nikoloz Basilashvili to become the first Brit to win the Indian Wells title.

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But Norrie's preparations were hindered when his footwear vanished.

"Every day I left my shoes on top of the locker," Norrie said. "I think someone, I don't know who it was, maybe someone from the cleaners or something last night, came through and they threw the three pairs of shoes that I had away.

I looked all day. I had everyone looking. You don´t want to be thinking about your shoes. At one point I said, ´All right, these are the shoes I got, I´m just going to focus on what I can control right now. I wore them in a little bit, and came good in the end."

Andy Murray suffered a similar incident earlier in the tournament when his shoes – with his wedding ring attached to the laces – disappeared from under a car.

"I don´t know what people have against the Brits with stealing the shoes," Norrie added.

"But I didn´t manage to get them back.

"Luckily, I didn´t have the wedding ring attached."

Cameron Norrie comes from a set down to claim biggest career title at Indian Wells

Norrie fought from a set and a break down to take the title, meaning he has risen to a career-high ranking of 16th, become British number one, and has put himself in contention for a spot at the ATP Finals this year.

Norrie is currently in 10th place in the race to Turin and sits just 115 points behind ninth-placed Herbert Hurkacz. Given Rafael Nadal has already brought his season to a close, ninth place will qualify.

And after Norrie sat 74th at the start of the year, six ATP finals and two wins later he is delighted to be in the mix for the Finals.

"I think even being in the conversation this late in the year with, what, four tournaments left after this, I think that's impressive for me," he said.

"If you would have told me before the year that would be the case, I would have been happy. I think that's a lot of good progression.

"[Next] I'm playing Vienna, Paris and Stockholm. It would be nice to make it, but I'm going to keep going, keep taking care of what I can and handling what I can."

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