After three Slams, two hip surgeries and endless self-flagellation, Andy Murray is set for his 1,000th match... but how much longer can he go on?
Andy Murray is set for his 1,000th match as he faces Alexei Popyrin at Queen's Murray has had misfortune with injuries but how much longer can he continue?
On Tuesday April 19, 2005, a 17-year-old Scot with a baggy shirt his body was waiting to fill out lost in three sets to Jan Hernych in Barcelona. We didn’t know it at the time, but this kid had tennis genius in his hands and the warrior heart of a highland chieftain beating within his breast.
Today, 19 years, three Grand Slam titles, a Davis Cup, two Olympic singles gold medals, two hip surgeries and countless self-flagellating hours of rehab later, Andy Murray will play his 1,000th Tour-level match, against Australian Alexei Popyrin at the Queen’s Club’s cinch Championships.
Over the last few torturous years, it has looked extremely unlikely Murray would hit that milestone. He played 653 matches in the eight years between 2008 and 2016 – and just 195 in the eight years since then.
But after two hip surgeries and plenty of soul-searching, he is still going.
Mail Sport takes a look back through the injury odyssey that has dominated so much of the second half of Murray’s career; and looks ahead to ask how far into his second millennium the 37-year-old will go before finally hanging up his racket.
Andy Murray is set for his 1,000th match as he takes on Alexei Popyrin at The Queen's Club
------------------------------
Before we delve into the vortex of injury issues, we need to go back to the day of perhaps Murray’s greatest achievement, at the end of 2016.
With a second Wimbledon title and an Olympic gold medal in the bag, the world No1 ranking was within reach.
Murray climbed for that peak with all his might, playing four tournaments in a row in October, winning the lot. At the climax of the season-ending World Tour Finals at the O2 Arena in London, he faced Novak Djokovic – whoever won the title would end the year as No1.
Murray beat his nemesis in straight sets and he was there, atop the summit of tennis Everest. Having watched him his entire career, it saddens me to this day he was allowed so little time to enjoy the view.
Murray overcame Novak Djokovic in 2016 and subsequently needed some time off
------------
In his on-court interview after beating Djokovic, Murray said: ‘I’m going to take some time off now - and I need it.’ None of us – and not Murray himself – knew how very much he needed it.
But regardless of his exhaustion, he and his granite-faced coach Ivan Lendl – the man in his box for all three Grand Slam titles – headed to Miami for 17 days for one of their infamously arduous training camps.
Did he push his body too hard in the last few months of 2016? Murray has since said: ‘I trained hard, probably too hard at certain stages in my career.’
The next season was horrible for Murray, as the hip pain he had long been managing intensified. He somehow reached the semi-finals of the French Open and took former champion Stan Wawrinka to five sets but by the end he was a broken man.
‘I couldn’t sleep that night. My hip was in so much pain. I couldn’t extend my leg behind me,’ he revealed at Roland Garros a few weeks ago, before a first-round reunion with Wawrinka.
He, probably unwisely, battled on to Wimbledon and a hobbling, halting quarter-final loss to Sam Querrey. Murray eventually listened to his body and put down his rackets.
Acknowledging that the hip problem needed dealing with was only the first move in a brutal battle. Murray was advised that outcomes for hip surgery are not great and so endured a five-month period of rest and rehab.
Then, in one of many instances of indecision, he flew to Melbourne with half an eye on a comeback at the Australian Open, but ended up going under the knife instead for his first hip surgery.
Murray managed to overcome Stan Wawrinka in the semi-finals of the French Open in 2016
In 2018 Murray was left exhausted after overcoming Marius Copil in Washington
He returned to the court on his beloved grass and got a first win in almost a year, at Eastbourne against Wawrinka (it is a curiosity of Murray’s injury saga how often the big Swiss crops up).
But he was not fit for Wimbledon and then came a win in Washington against Romanian Marius Copil, an epic which ended at 3.02am. After that match Murray buried his head in a towel and sobbed.
We never quite knew what cocktail of pain, sadness, joy or relief went into those tears after that Pyhrric victory until Murray’s Amazon Prime documentary Resurfacing was released.
Murray recorded a video message at 5am that night, saying: ‘I feel this is the end for me.
‘My body just doesn't want to do it anymore and my mind doesn't want to push through the pain barrier any more.
‘I was just hoping I was going to feel better than this after 16, 17 months.
‘I want to keep going but my body is telling me “no”.
’Those tears came again and this time in front of the world’s media at next year’s Australian Open. Murray said: ‘I’ve been struggling for a long time, I’ve been in a lot of pain for probably about 20 months.’ He declared his hope to retire at Wimbledon that year – but said the Australian Open could be the final event of his career.
There was a lavish ‘retirement’ ceremony for Murray after his defeat to Roberto Bautista Agut
The tournament took Murray at his word and arranged a lavish ‘retirement’ ceremony after his first-round, five-set defeat by Roberto Bautista Agut. It is seriously bizarre looking back on the video montage of farewell messages from fellow players. John Isner and Roger Federer were among those to wish him the best – both of whom have since retired while Murray soldiers on.
Murray’s final throw of the dice was an operation two weeks later that gave that documentary its name. Hip resurfacing surgery with Dr Sarah Muirhead-Allwood in London has, to an extent, given him a new lease of life.
The doubles title at Queen’s with Feliciano Lopez in June, 2019 was magical and that October he beat Wawrinka (him again) to win the Antwerp Open – still his only tour-level title since February 2017.
But progress since then has been halting and it seems like things are finally drawing to a close. Every week is a battle as he loses to, or ekes out narrow wins against, players with whom he would have wiped the floor in his prime.
Why has he put himself through all this, why does he continue to strive? It is nothing more complicated than all-consuming love of the game. Most players love the battle on court, the one-to-one struggle of will and mind and body. But the training, the tactics, the equipment, watching matches, locker-room camaraderie, even the travel – Murray loves all that, too.
----------------------
Murray still appears somewhat uncertain as to when he will bring his career to an end
So when will the greatest career in British tennis history come to an end? The short answer is we don’t know – and it seems Murray does not either.
In January he spoke of ‘not playing much beyond this summer’, and when asked on Sunday whether he was planning to play either the US Open, which begins in August, or a Davis Cup tie shortly after, he replied: ‘I don’t think so. Probably if I was going to finish my career I would rather finish at Wimbledon or an Olympic Games - to me that would probably be more fitting.
’That is the most definitive Murray has been in suggesting he will stop imminently – but those two instances of the word ‘probably’ are typical of the cagey language he has always used this year.
As focussed and decisive as he is on court he has been subject to wild indecision off it – ‘I change my mind all the time,’ he admitted during that tearful press conference in Australia back in 2019.
Well-placed sources have speculated that Murray had earmarked the Olympics as his final fling but he may not even play in Paris next month if he and Dan Evans do not make the cut in the doubles.
It remains possible that an ankle injury in Miami, which when first reported seemed to have the potential to end his career right there, may in fact serve to prolong it. It would have been easy for Murray to look at another stretch of rehab and decide enough was enough. But, as he told us in Paris: ‘I was surprised how I was during the rehab – I felt really motivated.’
Before even leaving Miami, Murray hobbled along to a sporting goods store and very near cleared out the tennis section. He bought 10 different rackets, lead tape which is used to add weight to a racket’s frame, and a weighing machine.
Back home in London he set to work tinkering and recalibrating. He headed to the National Tennis Centre and trialled different frames there, using their advanced Hawkeye technology to track the amount of spin and power he was getting with each racket.
In fact, it is understood that Murray had been borrowing lots of players’ rackets during practice sessions. He tried Hubert Hurkazc’s Yonex and Carlos Alcaraz’s Babolat.
He eventually settled on the Yonex Ezone 100, a much different frame to his Head PT57A. The Yonex racket has a bigger head with a distinctive, almost squared-off shape that gives a bigger ‘sweet spot’ and therefore more power.
Murray's career could end in the same way that is started, playing alongside brother Jamie
If Murray's form doesn't improve on grass then it seems likely that he will decide to retire
Does all this sound like the actions of a man winding down towards retirement? Tim Henman, speaking to Mail Sport, described the racket switch as evidence of Murray’s ‘insatiable appetite for more’.
Most athletes look ahead to retirement with some feelings of relief, even joy. Murray is not like that. He is being forced into a decision he does not want to make, by a body that does not want to keep going.
‘I think in lots of careers, retirement is something you celebrate and people really look forward to that day – that's not something I feel,’ he said at Queen’s. ‘I love playing tennis. ‘Ultimately, if physically you're not able to play to the level you want to, the results are not as you wish, those things factor into the decision.’
Murray arrives at the Queen’s Club on a run of four straight defeats that has taken him outside the top 100. If his form does not improve through the grass he is likely to decide enough is enough.
But if he feels the joints moving a little easier, the ball flying a little faster of the strings of his Yonex racket, do not rule out another change of heart.
A personal view, and one shared by many, is that Wimbledon is the right time to go. With a good draw he could still do something magical in the singles, but in all likelihood his career would finish in the men’s doubles, alongside Jamie.
His life in tennis would end as it began back home in Scotland: with two brothers from Dunblane, ready to take on the world.