After completing a perfect preparation to his 10th appearance at The Championships, Andy Murray faced the press exuding an air of quiet confidence ahead of his first-round meeting with Mikhail Kukushkin on Tuesday.
Both the world No.3 and No.3 seed at the All England Club, Murray has lost just three matches since February – all against world No.1 Novak Djokovic – and picked up his fourth title at Queen’s Club eight days before the third Grand Slam tournament of the year begins on Monday.
That title came after back-to-back clay trophies in Stuttgart and Madrid and a highly competitive five-set defeat to Djokovic in the semi-finals at Roland Garros.
“I didn’t actually feel like I played that well in Munich but I managed to win the event,” Murray said. “It gave me big confidence going into Madrid and I ended up having my best clay-court season by far.
“I enjoy playing in these high-pressure situations. That’s really what I play for now. I enjoy these events. I prepare extremely hard for them. I feel like I’m coming into the event as best prepared as I can be. Hopefully I can perform well.”
Amelie was one of the people that really stuck by me and supported me
The Scot holds a 2-0 head-to-head record over his first-round opponent, world No.58 Kukushkin, and beyond that will potentially face Dutchman Robin Haase in round two, before a third-round date that is likely to be with either No.25 seed Italian Andreas Seppi, Croatian youngster Borna Coric or Ukraine’s Sergiy Stakhovsky.
With nine Wimbledon campaigns already under his belt, however, the 2013 champion knows the value of approaching The Championships one round at a time.
“The most important thing is to concentrate on your first match,” Murray said. “It’s very easy to get carried away and look ahead, think ‘I’m playing great tennis, everything’s going to be fine.’
“But the reality is that it doesn’t really matter what’s happened the rest of the year or in the build-up to the event as I think Stan [Wawrinka] proved at the French Open.
"You have to make sure you’re ready each day for every opponent you come up against.”
Much has been made of the team that now surrounds the British No.1 and the combined effect coaches Amelie Mauresmo and Jonas Bjorkman have had on his results this year.
The Scot is in agreement and says that Mauresmo, in particular, has helped boost his self-belief.
“I had an extremely tough loss at the end of last year [Murray lost 6-0, 6-1 to Roger Federer at the ATP Finals] and Amelie was one of the people that really stuck by me and supported me,” Murray revealed. “I’m glad that I’ve been able to kind of repay her faith in me with some good tennis this year.”
As for former Wimbledon singles semi-finalist Bjorkman, Murray hopes that certain tactical elements of the way the Swede played the game will help him produce a more positive brand of grass-court tennis over the next fortnight.
“Some of the things I wanted to work on in my game I felt like he could help me with because of his experience and playing that way, trying to come forward more and being aggressive on the returns. He was extremely good at that.”
