British No 1 urges caution ahead of final in November
doubles rubber against Sam Groth and Lleyton Hewitt on Saturday.
“I’ve thought about what it means to reach the final, but let’s not [get ahead of ourselves] and think about winning the event,” said Andy Murray. “There’s so much tennis still to go. There’s still two or three months before the next tie and a lot can happen between now and then.
“Belgium have a player, [David] Goffin, who’s very close to being in the top ten in the world – and it’s possible that by then he is.
“Whichever surface they will pick will be one that they think gives them the best chance so there are no guarantees. But reaching the final is something that Great Britain hasn’t done for a long time. Everyone in the team should be very proud of that.”
Not only did Murray play three consecutive days of tennis, he also revealed that he had done so with a back injury. He quickly dismissed fears it was a recurrence of the problem that saw him have surgery two years ago to correct a long-standing issue.
“It’s nothing to do with the previous issues that I had with my back, it’s a completely different thing,” he said. “It was absolutely fine during US Open. Then I took five days off and then I practiced Sunday, Monday, Tuesday here and felt absolutely fine. But on Tuesday night once I’d finished practicing and cooleddown, my back was extremely sore. It got progressively worse over the next couple of days.
“I didn’t feel it when I was playing on the Tuesday so I don’t exactly know what happened,” he added.
Great Britain captain, Leon Smith, later stressed how much British tennis owed Murray, particularly given the toll being taken on him by such commitments.
Reflecting on a journey that has taken Great Britain from narrowly avoiding relegation five years ago to Europe/africa Zone Group III, the bottom tier of the Davis Cup, Smith said it had been “a long journey”. Being able to rely on Murray in recent times has been a critical factor in the improvement in fortunes.
“When Andy has been here, it’s just made such a huge difference to us,” said Smith. “His commitment to the team has just been absolutely incredible. He will play it down because he’s modest.
“But everyone watches in nothing other than the most amount of respect you can have for someone. You watch how he goes about his business during the week.
“He’s been quite open there saying how his back felt. It’s incredible that he was able to go out and play all three days, it really is. We owe Andy a lot, given what he brings to the team.”
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