Andy Murray said he did not know whether play would go ahead at the Rothesay Nottingham Open after the “heartbreaking” incident in the city centre overnight.
Three people were killed and another three were in hospital after an attack in the early hours of Tuesday morning, with much of the local area cordoned off.
Play did go ahead as planned and Murray, fresh from his title success at Surbiton last week, got his campaign in the ATP Challenger Tour event off to a winning start with a routine 6-3, 6-4 victory over Belgian minnow Joris De Loore.
But Murray, who ate out in Nottingham city centre not far from where the attacks happened, said the incident was “way more important than tennis”.
He said: “It was obviously shocking when I woke up this morning and when I was going down to breakfast a few messages on our team chat came up,” he said.
“We are staying in the city centre and had been out for dinner last night and walking around those areas. You never expect something like that to happen, it was really shocking.
“I didn’t know if it was going to affect anything here or not because the streets were closed this morning. Really shocking and obviously heartbreaking for the victims and the people involved so hopefully everyone is safe now.
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“We were talking about it this morning, saying that we didn’t know if the tournament was going to be suspended for the day because there are way more important things than a tennis event and we didn’t know first thing what was going on because it happened in the middle of the night.
“It is a bit unsettling, it seems like everything is under control now but it was shocking news to wake up to.”
Tournament organisers confirmed there will be a minute’s silence in memory of the three victims ahead of play on Wednesday morning.
Top seed Murray will be back in action on Thursday as he will face Hugo Grenier from France in the second round.
There were also first-round wins for Murray’s fellow Brits Ryan Penniston, George Loffhagen, Arthur Frey and Liam Broady.
Second seed Constant Lestienne, fourth seed Aleksandar Vukic, sixth seed Thanasi Kokkinakis and seventh seed Aleksandar Kovacevic all lost on Tuesday.
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