Who do you think will win ? [Can one of the mods do the poll] They've never played before. Blake is 26, world no 7 and in the form of his life. He had a highly impressive 7-5, 6-3 win over former French Open champion Carlos Moya in rd1 here. However, prior to Hamburg, Blake's clay-court form has been non-existent. He lost in rd1 of Rome to France's Florent Serra 6-4, 7-6 and in rd1 of Houston to Anthony Dupuis who's a grass-court specialist. However, Blake has the ability to produce great tennis on slow courts. Earlier this year, he was virtually unstoppable in the US outdoor hard court tournaments. He won ATP Las Vegas [beating Hewitt in the final], reached the final of Indian Wells [beating Nadal in the semis] and the quarters of Miami [losing only to Federer in both those events]. Blake's strengths are an accurate, powerful serve, he possesses a laser-like forehand and a single-handed backhand which is one of the best in men's tennis. He is one of the fastest players on the tour, his court coverage and athleticism are 2nd only to Nadal He will take some stopping but clay is his weakest surface so Andy has a chance. All players with single-handed backhands, struggle against high bouncing shots with lots of topspin, directed at their backhand. This is because, the higher the ball bounces, the harder it is to control the backhand. This is one area which Andy may look to target.
Murray has said word to that affect about hitting it high to his bh, have to correct you on the score Blake beat Moya by he beat him in 3 (6-3, 3-6, 7-5), and both played good tennis. Undoubtedly it will be more difficult for Murray than Monfils but he likes the big occasion hopefully this will be on center court as then the wind wont be able to affect play.
Also interesting words murray used in the interview about he is getting back to how he used to play last season. He also knows what he needs to improve on, also he says that Larry Stefanki almost certainly wont be his coach as Gonzalez got to him first. Murray also said he wasnt his number 1 choice. Full interview below:- (from the official website)
Hamburg, 16 May 2006
Press Conference withANDY MURRAY
Murray - Monfils 6:4, 6:1
Q: Giving the conditions …
MURRAY: Yes, I played one of my best clay court matches. Against Ferrero in Barcelona I probably played better in the first two sets but it was a high quality match there. But today it was tough. It was very windy. When the sun came out, the shadow was covering half of the court which made it very tough to return from one of the sides. He was obviously very confident after making semis last week. But I played the right way.
Q: You were also very patient. You didn't try to go for too much.
MURRAY: Yes, I thought when I had the chance to go for it I did. A lot of people would think that I should play more aggressive. But if I win against a guy who is making the semis of a Masters Series and beating him 6:4, 6:1, there is obviously not that much that I can do better. If I play my game very well, it's almost good enough. But there are some things I have to work on. If I get a better first serve and improve my volleys against the top players I will come out on top a lot of times I think. But I played very solid the whole match, didn't make a lot of mistakes, I got him up to the net. He doesn't enjoy being up there too much and my drop shots worked for the first time in about six months (laughs), so I'm pretty happy with that.
Q: Do you think that sort of tactic would work against Blake?
MURRAY: Blake plays a bit closer up to the baseline, but he doesn't like to play with his forehand. He doesn't come to the net too much. He comes up to knock volleys off, but I think if you can bring him in with short slices … But the drop shots will be tougher to play against him because he plays tighter to the baseline and he plays much flatter than Monfils.
Q: Are you relieved to get a good win after the disappointing last few weeks?
MURRAY: It has not been too disappointing. My match in Monte Carlo wasn't good, but I still served for the match. If I had won that, it would have been a good solid win. And obviously in Barcelona I served for the match against Ferrero as well and if I had won that, it would have been beating a Top 10 player on clay. So, I have been playing okay. My worst match was probably last week. But you go stages like that. I will probably go through worse spells. It's just about getting the breaks and having the confidence to keep believing in yourself and working hard when you are not on a good run like I did in San Jose and Memphis, to keep that sort of level up and get some more points and push my rankings up.
Q: Getting so close to that wins, did it not damage your confidence?
MURRAY: I doesn't damage it a lot. But like when you go to serve the first set like I did today and Monfils got 5:4 in the first set, you just use a little bit more nerves than last year when there wasn't as much pressure on me to win these sort of matches. It doesn't bang your confidence too much but it's just when you get to the important stages and you start winning those close matches, your confidence grows again.
Q: Has it been more difficult to find your rhythm? Last year nobody knew you and now you need to defend points?
MURRAY: No, I think when I get to 21, 22, it will be a little bit more important to defend points and your ranking going back some weeks and then going up. It's all about performing in the big matches if your ranking is going to go up. I've lost some pretty close matches this year but I also won some big ones. But I need to do it more consistently if I want my ranking to go up. But at the end of the day it's not merely about the defending points because at the end of the day your points start in January and go through to December. And it's just who performs best throughout the year finishes at the top of the ranking.
Q: There was something about you teaming up with Larry Stefanki. Could you light up the situation what you might or might not be doing?
MURRAY: Larry was on the list of guys that I would have liked to work with. I am looking for a guy, who has worked with top players and won Grand Slams with them. Larry has worked with Rios and Kafelnikov and Henman. Rios and Kafelnikov were No. 1 in the world. Kafelnikov won a couple of Slams and obviously Tim got to No. 4 in the world. So, Larry is a very good coach and he's the sort of guy I'm looking at. But unfortunately I think he's going to work with Gonzalez, because he has spoken to him before I got to him which is not too disappointing. There's more coaches than just one; he wasn't no. 1 on my list but he was up there with the top guys I'm looking at.
Q: Tim had one of the best phases of his career when he was without a coach. Of course he was at a different stage of his career. Does it make it difficult for you right now?
MURRAY: You're still learning a lot. I think when you get to 26, 27, your game doesn't necessarily get much better than what it is. But you still have time to work on things. And unless you have a coach, I can maybe feel some things but I can't really see what I'm doing on the court and what mistakes I'm making, if I'm throwing the ball too far to the right than I normally do. The coach can point that out for you. But just now, I can't see it that much. But at the same time, it's not a bad thing to be on your own for a little while to learn how to run on your own. And I've gone through not the best patch since I've started on the Tour. I think today I dealt with it pretty well. So, it does help to have a coach when you're this young, but at the same time it's maybe helping me a little bit but I don't want it to go on for five, six months.
Q: Did you do anything different on your birthday? Anything unusual?
MURRAY: Not really. I got woken up by my mum earlier than I would have liked yesterday. She brought 3 balloons and stuck them outside my door which, when I opened it, I swiftly bust (laughs). I practiced for a couple of hours, went out for dinner. That was about it. Got some nice presents. Actually it was different to last year because I spent it on my own. I was actually in Germany playing a Challenger with my old coach. He was 70. So, it was more fun yesterday than it was last year.
Q: It seemed to have put you in the right frame of mind?
MURRAY: I felt better this week than I did the last couple of weeks. I think it showed on court. I went back to what I was doing last year, I was preparing for my matches. The last few weeks, I haven't quite been like I was last year tough to beat and I think today I was back to doing what I did best last year.
Q: Is it difficult to find a good coach. Can the Federation help you?
MURRAY: It's difficult to find a good coach you can do everything you want. People don't understand that it's tough to find a coach, who can travel 25 weeks a year. And when you have a practice week he can come to see you. Obviously, money, how much it costs, what tournaments he comes to, which tournaments he doesn't want to come to, what time he wants to spend with his family or wife. There's a lot of complications. But I think everybody has problems to find coaches because it's like that. But there is a lot of coaches I'm looking at. So, I'm sure I will be able to find one.
Any person who is compelled to burst balloons is always destined for great things. Macenroe was a notorious balloon-burster, as was Becker, in his prime.
OOP shows murray plays blake is 4th on centre court, so approx. 3/4pm our time.
i think murray will beat blake, i think blake had a bit of luck 2 beat moyas. andy starting to show his talent and feels relax about it, so gud luk murray!!!
1 more set to go before the Murray match. Schuettler and Ferrero are one set apiece.
According to Rob C, Murray needs to beat Blake to reclaim the British number 1 spot and hold off the challenges of Simon and Soderling who are threatening to overtake him.
It's going to be really tough for Andy but as it's on clay he's got a chance. My friend has been watching Murray over the last few weeks and he says that Murray's still very impatient on clay, he needs to have more patience in the rallies and try to construct points instead of going for a drop shot on shot 4 or a massive forehand from 10 feet behind the baseline which isn't a percentage shot. He agrees with kundalini the Murray backhand down the line is a world-class shot.
I've gone for Andy in 3.
Kundalini, how do you rate Andy's chances in this match ? Have you seen Blake on clay, what's he like ?
I'm hoping that the slow Hamburg clay will take the sting out of Blake's powerful serve and forehand.