Kyle Edmund beats Andy Murray for first time in straight-sets victory at Eastbourne

KYLE EDMUND can truly call himself the British No 1 after beating Andy Murray for the first time.

Edmund showed he is currently the nation’s male player on court as well as by ranking in a 6-4 6-4 victory which raises fresh doubts about Murray’s readiness to play at Wimbledon next week.

The Yorkshireman is only the fifth British player ever to beat Murray and the first since Tim Henman in 2006.

The Scot may yet find a way to recover enough form and fitness to challenge Edmund for the British No 1 slot.

But Murray is struggling at the moment and the third match of his comeback featured a number of unforced errors, as well as a serve must reduced in power.

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Murray set the tone for the evening by double-faulting on the first point and then dropping serve.

The Scot had four break points in the following game but could take none of them and did not get to 30 on the Edmund serve again in the rest of the set.

Murray avoided going a double break down but could do little to stop his compatriot taking the set.

As if the rub-in the difference in their serve speeds and overall play, Edmund closed it out with a 117mph second serve ace.

The pattern continued in the second set.

Murray’s fighting spirit was still there as he battled to hold serve. He saved two break points in the third game and celebrated with a shout of “Let’s go, come on, let’s go!”

But Edmund continued to go quietly about his business.

Three times he held break point in the fifth game and three times Murray saved himself.

But on the fourth the Scot double faulted and bounced his racket off the Devonshire Park turf in frustration.

Another break of serve gave Edmund the chance to serve for the match and he faltered for the first time, giving Murray a glimmer of hope that he could pull off one of his famous comebacks.

But Edmund made no mistake at the second time of asking. The question now it whether it would be a mistake for Murray to try to play best-of-five-set matches at Wimbledon when he is clearly struggling to cope with best of three at the moment.

Edmund said: "Andy has been at the top so long.

"It's really incredible what he's done in British tennis and world tennis.

"He's going to go down as one of the best tennis players of all time, so he means a lot to everyone in British tennis.

"For me, as someone British who has looked up to him, someone who has been so good to me, it was a bit strange to beat him.

"It was a tough match mentally. I just had to try and view it as another tennis match."