ONE down, two to go. Andy Murray last night scrapped his way to the first stage of the personal hat-trick Great Britain requires to win their first Davis Cup title since 1936 to leave this final balanced on a knife edge at 1-1 ahead of Saturday's doubles. Taking over after Kyle Edmund, the 20-year-old Yorkshireman had gone down dramatically in five sets to Belgium's No 1 player David Goffin, Murray put the first point on the board for the British team with a straight sets victory against Ruben Bemelmans, the World No 108, in an at times bad tempered match at the Flanders Expo Centre in Ghent. He and his brother Jamie will now aim to give Leon Smith's side an advantage in the doubles against a Belgian team which at the moment is Steve Darcis and Kimmer Coppejans, but could be changed up until an hour before the start.

While the 6-3, 6-2, 7-5 scoreline looks straightforward enough, the World No 2 had to contend with an opponent who seemed hell bent on draining his resources with a series of drop shots, and an umpire in Carlos Ramos who angered him and captain Leon Smith for a point penalty for repeated audible obscenity. Belgium were also administered with a team warning from match referee Soren Friemel for failing to control their fans, who were accused of hissing prior to Murray's serves. At times, this was the tennis equivalent of a square go, with jaikits aff.

"There was a very big atmosphere and there is noise when you are serving but you have to use that to your advantage," he said. "It [the doubles] is obviously a big match, you don't know who they are going to play but me and Jamie have played some really good doubles and hopefully we can do that again tomorrow.

Such dramas had seemed a lifetime away when Murray and Bemelmans arrived in mid-afternoon, greeted by a crowd featuring both loud hailers and French horns. Bemelmans, a 27-year-old left hander, wasn't expected to detain the Scot too long and when he surrendered his serve for 2-0 in that opening set that prediction seemed likely to come to pass. A couple of canny drop shots saw the Belgian break straight back, though, the first sign of the dramas to come.

The Scot slipped to earth in the course of that opening set, his navy top suddenly flecked with dark red clay, but he dusted himself down, secured the break point for 3-2 and before long the set was in the books.

There was more of the same in the second, with Murray magnanimously overruling a line call on a first serve let, before breaking in the first game of the set. A second break for 5-2 took the pressure off before he duly served it out for 6-2.

A 65-minute third set was where the gloves really came off, though. The point penalty arrived with Bemelmans serving at 2-2, helping the Belgian eventually to a difficult hold. And when the Belgian broke for 4-2 it seemed like the Scot, with the world seemingly against him, would be forced into the ordeal of a fourth set. His competitive instincts were having none of that, though. He broke back for 4-4, saved a set point at 4-5, and eventually came through on his first match point for 7-5.