Andy’s on the road to recovery
Injured Scot tipped to be fighting fit in time for Australian Open:
ONE of the most significant voices in the tennis world is confident that Andy Murray will be fit to return to the Australian Open in January.
The words of Craig Tiley, the event’s tournament director, carry some weight as he has a close relationship with the former world No 1.
He has even struck a partnership with Murray on behalf of Tennis Australia to promote tournaments in the country, which sees the 30-year-old Scot scheduled to make his fully competitive comeback at the Brisbane International in early January.
Given how secretive Murray has been about the progress, or otherwise, of his attempts to recover from a hip injury, it constitutes a rare statement of what his intentions are.
‘On the men’s side, there has been a lot of concern and conjecture around Andy Murray,’ said Tiley.
‘I can tell you that, in talking to Andy, he has been training and is preparing for having a great year in 2018. As competitive as Andy is, we know he’s back and he’ll want to improve his current ranking of No 3 and get back to No 1.’
Murray is known to be doing rehab work with his team but has offered no proper updates since his late withdrawal from the US Open in August. The ATP confirmed he is yet to formally pull out of next month’s Paris Masters at Bercy.
He is definitely planning to play his charity exhibition match against Roger Federer in Glasgow on November 7.
Tiley also insisted that Serena Williams is set to return to action at the Australian Open, following the birth of her baby boy on September 1.
‘She wants to come back in 2018 and defend her title,’ he said. ‘Obviously, there are several months to go and it will be up to her as far as where she is with her fitness.’
That chimes with noises emanating from the Williams camp, which indicate that Serena — who has begun training near her Florida home — is intent on coming back as quickly as possible.
Meanwhile, Nick Kyrgios is facing his second investigation in a year by the ATP Tour after walking off court in his opening match at the Shanghai Masters.
The controversial Australian had lost a first-set tiebreak to American Steve Johnson when he walked up to the net and shook hands before leaving the court to a chorus of boos, apparently uninjured.
It was confirmed last night that he will have to answer again to ATP bosses, just 12 months after a similar incident on the same court in Shanghai when he blatantly ‘tanked’ a match against Germany’s Mischa Zverev.
Kyrgios issued a swift public apology after yesterday’s match, explaining that he had a stomach upset and a sore shoulder.
‘I was really struggling on court, which was pretty evident from the first point,’ he said, adding that he was ‘gutted’.
It remains to be seen whether that will be deemed sufficient.
Twelve months ago he was fined £20,000 and banned for eight weeks.