Limping Murray is back out on the town as the big guns target Federer

ANDY MURRAY was up and about on Thursday evening, dining at one of Melbourne’s top Italian restaurants in the company of his mother and his support team. Although walking with a limp, it evidently did not take long for him to leave his post-operational bed and — ten days after stating: ‘I’ll be flying home shortly to assess all the options’ — he is still in Australia following surgery. The 30-year-old Scot even found time to attend a meeting of the ATP player council, of which he is a member, on Friday night at a city hotel. So he has not completely missed the Australian Open, and did not rule out turning up when it starts tomorrow, but it will be the first time since 2005 that he is not here as a participant. While time will tell if Murray’s initial optimism about playing at Wimbledon this summer is well placed, he is the biggest absentee in the men’s draw after Stan Wawrinka finally declared himself fit enough yesterday to give it a try. He is among those in a remarkable state of unreadiness to challenge Roger Federer, the only serious big hitter with a clean bill of health. Wawrinka, Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal have 31 Grand Slam titles between them but have not played an official match in the lead-in to the event, with Wawrinka and Djokovic not having hit a ball in anger since Wimbledon. Nadal came up with a novel idea to try to shake off some of the ring rust on Friday when he asked to play a practice match on Margaret Court Arena against Austria’s Dominic Thiem under match conditions, complete with umpire, ballkids, scoreboards and a crowd. This is the sort of thing you can arrange with a tournament when you have the clout of a world No 1, although it does slightly smack of favouritism. It is hard to imagine the same privilege being offered to a rank-and-file player.

Nadal explained yesterday that he did not feel the conditions at the exhibition event at nearby Kooyong were similar enough to Melbourne Park. ‘The club in Kooyong is great, but at the same time the conditions of play are completely different from here. We decided to play another match. The Australian Open gave us the chance to play like an open practice for the crowd. It was good for both of us.’

Nadal looked sharp. Given his remarkable ability to steadily improve during a fortnight, the odds of 5-1 on him might be generous, although he has never won a Grand Slam without having played an official warm-up event of some kind.

Djokovic clarified yesterday that he has not had surgery on his elbow, but has undergone months of rehab. Like Murray, he is coy about his injury, but admitted: ‘It hasn’t 100 per cent healed. But right now it’s at the level where I can compete.’

Kyle Edmund is fit and the only British male in the singles draw, playing US Open finalist Kevin Anderson.