Brothers in arms /Jamie plans to team up with Andy in Wimbledon doubles
By Aidan Smith The coronavirus shutdown has taken Jamie Murray off court but the Scottish tennis hero is not slacking off - he still has a career Grand Slam firmly in his sights, wants to play with brother Andy at Wimbledon, needs to stay fit so he can pl
Jamie Murray has revealed that he hopes to team up with his brother Andy in the doubles at Wimbledon.
The French Open has already been moved from May to September due to the coronavirus crisis and there are obvious doubts that play will get under way at SW19 in July.
But whenever Wimbledon does go ahead, the Murrays are keen to link up, just as they did when helping Great Britain win the Davis Cup in 2015.
“We don’t know what will happen with Andy’s hip but we hope he’s going to get back fit and get back on to the court,” said Jamie. “I haven’t seen him for a while but I know he’s been practising which is good news.
“We’ve always said we wanted to play Wimbledon one time together before we stop and hopefully we’ll get that chance.”
It’s not all glamour in elite tennis, you know. I’ve just seen Jamie Murray with his collar up and his beanie pulled right down, which might protect him against a familiar hazard for Brits in his sport but isn’t much cop when confronted with the great unknown. “It’s just three degrees and the rain’s been sideways and non-stop all day,” he explains, speaking into his camera-phone, before adding: “The coronavirus is flying everywhere.” The Scot is about to expose himself to London’s Underground so it’s little wonder he signs off: “Indian Wells can’t come quickly enough.”
This is Murray, vlogging not volleying, the star of the fourth season of
one of the network cable treats on the Tennis Channel, and now more than ever with the sport having been suspended, station bosses must be glad to have his chipper personality and the droll humour that’s a match for little brother Andy.
The second half of the most recent edition of the show has Murray making it to the Californian city which hosts what he calls “our biggest tournament of the ATP tour” – but with Coachella Valley in a state of emergency no tennis is played. “It feels weird,” he says from the locker-room. “There are something like 150 players here but no fans. I didn’t see this coming.” The final scene is Murray in a shopping centre car park: “Sitting here with nothing to do except kill time while I wait for my plane home. Massive thunderstorm on the way as well… ”
Somewhere in between these two dispatches, I speak to Murray. Although unable to see him, his downcast mood is obvious. There are bigger and more vital concerns than tennis right now, he knows this, but he still allows himself to wonder when he will next get to play. He had high hopes for 2020 and serious ambitions. Still does.
He has just wondered about the rest of the campaign out loud, on Twitter: “Doesn’t bode well… French Open? Wimbledon?!!!” The concern was well-placed. Roland Garros has now been moved to September and it must be unlikely that the All-england Club will be able to hold on to their traditional July. These are Majors so would be uppermost in Murray’s thoughts in any case, but more than that, they are the only two in men’s doubles which he hasn’t won.
“I’d love to achieve a career Grand Slam before I stop,” he says. Is retirement in his thoughts? Definitely not. A couple of weeks ago he turned 34. Invariably on tour when his birthday comes round, he was in Rotterdam this time and celebrated quietly over dinner with his wife Alejandra Gutierrez, playing partner Neal Skupski and coach Louis Cayer – but he was back on court the next day. He admits it is difficult to contemplate the end.
“I’m not thinking about the moment I have to stop and I don’t really want to. Older pros always say: ‘Play as long as you can’. As long as I’m fit and healthy, as long as my ranking enables me to compete in the biggest tournaments in the world, as long I’m still enjoying tennis, I fully intend to. Play into my 40s – why not?”
Unlike poor Andy, Jamie has avoided serious injury, which is pretty good going for such a tall player, nicknamed “Stretch” by Cayer. “Touch wood, I haven’t had any of the big stuff.” Competing 25 to 30 weeks of the year he divides training 50-50 between court and gym. Squats and jumps help keep the fast-twitch fibres in good nick, though these diminish with age. “Once you stop, that’ll be that, won’t it? Recreating what tennis gives you someplace else – walking out on to the court in front of a big crowd, the energy you take from that and the drama and tension and excitement of a match as it unfolds – that’s going to be impossible, I realise that.”
Surely, though, there has been the odd reflective moment – during the squats, perhaps – when he has allowed his mind to wander and wonder what the post-tennis life might involve? “Can’t say I have,” he says. Reality TV, perhaps? “That sounds like a two or three-month commitment
– too long.”
following mum Judy on to the dancefloor, would grab him at the first opportunity. “Not. A. Chance!” Well, media openings will present themselves, I’m sure. Murray is a personable host of his Youtube channel and, as his grandfather Roy Erskine once told me with an impish grin, he is the most handsome of the Murrays. But he stresses: he ain’t quitting yet.
Murray’s golden year – indeed the apotheosis for both brothers – was 2016 when both rose to No 1 in the world, Jamie on the back of his other Slam triumphs in Australia and at the US Open.
His partner in Melbourne and New York was the Brazilian, Bruno Soares, and he believes there is more success to come with England’s Skupski. “We started playing at Wimbledon last year and got off to a bit of a slow start. But from August onwards we won a lot of matches and achieved good momentum going into off-season. This year, what there’s been of it, has not quite happened for us yet. We lost a lot of tiebreaks and there were some close matches where we weren’t quite able to find a way to win. But, as long as we get back playing tennis at some point, I’m sure we can still have a good 2020.”
This interrupted campaign has still taken Murray to another final even though at the Australian he and Bethanie Mattek-sands of America lost in the mixed doubles. He is similarly optimistic this partnership can add to the Slams he has won in mixed at Wimbledon (twice) and the US (three times). “Beth’s an amazing player and I’ve been lucky to get the chance to compete with her,” he adds.
The decorum of doubles has changed in the time Murray has been playing: now every point must be congratulated, or commiserated about, with a fist-bump or high-five. But it has always been the case that pairings don’t fall out on court. They simply can’t, according to our man.
“I’ve never suffered a meltdown too many times on court, either with myself or my partner,” he says. “Doubles is a team sport at the end of the day and on court you can’t hide. In football if someone is having a shocker they can be substituted or if they stay on the pitch there might be somewhere for them to tuck themselves away for a bit. In doubles it’s you and your partner so you have to do everything you can to perform as well as you can and at the same time help them.”
Teamwork at home has played a big part in Murray’s success. Alejandra doesn’t play tennis and knew nothing about the sport when they met. Her skills are in marketing and he knows it was her pragmatic, clear-thinking business head which saved his career when it wasn’t going well and he was even contemplating giving up. “Around 2011-12 my ranking had dropped and I was struggling,” he says. “She made a plan. ‘Let’s work out how we’re going to get your career back to where it should be’, she said. She’s always believed in me and the talents I had and knew I could do better. She was a huge support to me then and still is now.”
Alejandra is Colombian and Murray loves visiting her homeland – “a really cool place”. Mind you, the last trip to Bogota before Christmas to see her parents caused him some anxiety after a Colombian player had failed a drugs test, blaming this on impurities in the local beef. “I was a bit worried because I’d been to quite a few barbe
“As long I’m fit and healthy and still enjoying tennis, I fully intend to keep playing. Play into my 40s – why not? Once you stop, that’ll be that, won’t it? Recreating what tennis gives you someplace else – walking out on to the court in front of a big crowd, the energy you take from that and the drama and tension and excitement of a match as it unfolds – that’s going to be impossible, I realise that”