By Erik Gudris | Saturday, July 28, 2018
Andy Murray says he feels ready to restart his comeback after choosing to miss out on Wimbledon. The former No.1 is back in Washington, D.C. to compete at the Citi Open as the summer hard court swing continues.
Murray, after missing over a year on tour along with having hip surgery, came back to the tour at Queen’s Club last month. But Murray, not feeling quite ready, chose to skip Wimbledon to give himself more time to recover.
Murray spoke to the media prior to main draw action starting on Monday at the combined ATP and WTA event. Murray said he started practicing on hard courts the Monday that Wimbledon began.
When asked if his hip feels 100% percent, Murray didn’t want to put a number on how he feels.
It’s tough to put a number on it I think. It just takes time when you’ve been out for a long period to get the match sharpness back,” Murray said. “I’ve only played three matches in the last year so I need to try to get back on the match court and see how I’m feeling after I played two, three, four matches but I’ve done a lot of training recently and I’ve come through that pretty well so hopefully when I get into that situation I’ll be all right.”
Murray also said he doesn’t have specific ranking goals and hopes that with enough match play, the results will boost his ranking in no time.
“I want to stay healthy through the end of the year and if I do that I’ll start to win more matches and my ranking will move up. If I have to play one or two tournaments and then take a break it’s difficult to get into that routine. So if I’m stay fit and healthy I’m not so worried about ranking. I want to be competing against the best players and that will build my fitness up quicker than anything I can do in the gym so that’s my goal between now and the end of the year. So hopefully I’ll be ready to start the 2019 season really well.”
Murray did do some working during Wimbledon, though not on the court. Murray did some television broadcasting with the BBC during the tournament. While many fans enjoyed his commentary, being in the broadcast booth is not something Murray says he would resume once his playing days are over.
Watching as a spectator, Murray also realized just how long some five set matches take to finish.
“It was fun to do it and it was the first time in a long time that I’ve watched a match as a spectator. When I’ve watched it before, it’s been as a player and I was watching for tactics, and kind of thinking what I would do as a player and where as that was the first time I sat down and watched a full five set match in ages and I realized as a fan just how long that is, it was a five hour match. Apart from the people in the stadium and there are loads of people who can sit in the middle of the week and watch five hours is very difficult is one thing I learned from it. I enjoyed it but I don’t think it’s something I would do full time like after I finish playing. If I had a choice between that and coaching, I would choose coaching if I were honest.”
Speaking of long five set matches, Murray was asked his thoughts on the on-going conversation about possibly adding a final set tiebreak at Wimbledon. This is in response to the super long semifinal played by John Isner and Kevin Anderson that ended up causing havoc with the finals scheduling.
“It’s a really difficulty one because as a player I’ve always loved five set tennis and its kind of difference between the ATP events and the Slams makes the event more special. But like I said that first time I was on the other side of things as spectator you know the match was extremely long and you have the semifinal day at Wimbledon and you have the matches starting at one and going until 11 and there was no stopping due for rain and perfect weather and they still couldn’t get two matches completed in ten hours of tennis.
Murray added, “I think in the biggest events you want the players in the final to be physically able to hopefully play their best tennis and show their best levels. And so in some situations like what happened at Wimbledon I don’t you’re going to get that when someone plays for six and a half hours. It’s very difficult to recover from that and not feel good so that’s also not good for the game.”
Murray will first play American Mackenzie McDonald in the opening round.