By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Monday May 2, 2022
The early days of Andy Murray’s third go-around with coach Ivan Lendl are looking very positive.
Murray has been off the court since losing in the second round at Miami to Daniil Medvedev, but he looked seasoned and played with clarity on Monday at Madrid.
His 6-3, 6-4 victory over Dominic Thiem marked his first victory on clay since 2017 at Roland-Garros. Though Murray has not played much on the surface, his game has always made sense on clay. He was pleased that it went so well today, and told reporters that he feels his hard work has been paying off.
“I put in lots and lots of work, you know, this last little period,” he said. “I wanted to go out and put on a good performance. Obviously I have had some doubts and stuff, about my own game at times over this last period, but I do feel like I have started to play some better tennis, and I'm definitely moving better and moved very well tonight.”
Murray, who will face Denis Shapovalov in second-round action on Tuesday evening in Madrid, says the fact that his movement is on point helps him concentrate more on tactics, and he was pleased with how much clarity he had today against Thiem.
“That's a really important part of my game,” he said of his movement. “Allows me to concentrate on the strategy a little bit more when I'm out there. I was just really happy all around with how I competed, how I played, how I moved, how my body felt. After such a long time of playing on clay, like, I didn't know if I was still necessarily capable of playing at that level on this surface. That's why I was happy.
Murray had initially planned to skip the clay court season entirely, but when some of the challengers he was planning to play cancelled he realized that nine weeks off between matches was too long of a time to go without competitive tennis.
Now that he’s arrived in Madrid, and put a win under his belt, he’s growing his confidence, no matter the surface.
He didn’t mention Lendl in his post-match press conference but it certainly looks and feels like the partnership is paying dividends once again.
“I felt very clear about how I wanted to play tonight,” he said. “I have worked really hard the last four or five weeks, probably longer than that. Sort of before I went to Indian Wells, I felt like I was starting to become a little bit clearer with what I wanted to do and was therefore maybe more engaged in the practices and believing that I'm doing the right things.
“I feel like in the important moments that helps when you have a clear head and clear thoughts. You know, from that side, like mentally, I did really, really well tonight. I'm really proud of that side of things. You know, my attitude and my energy on the court was really good. Yeah, try and keep that going.”