Looking at his playing activity he has only played 3 hard court tournaments and went out first round each time bar one where he won one game. He predominently plasy caly court cahllenger tournaments-
Andy has to win this one as the man dosent even bother to play hard courts and that is andys forte
Well, I thought, the guy can't be that bad on hard courts, he has come through qualifying - but then I checked, and he beat 2 wild cards! (mind you, the second of the 2 wild cards had beaten Ramirez Hidalgo in the 1st round. . .)
So yes, if Andy doesn't win this one he deserves a good spanking.
Looking ahead to the match, Murray said: "These are the tournaments you want to perform well in and I feel like I'm playing well right now so it's going to be good."
An article from today's Independent: [Murray feels sting of rankings slip]:
"You had only to look at the line-up for yesterday's final qualifying matches here at the Mutua Madrilena Masters to appreciate the quality of the field that Andy Murray and Tim Henman will be facing this week. Among those who fell at the last hurdle were Mikhail Youzhny, a US Open semi-finalist last month, and Nicolas Almagro, one of the year's leading Spaniards.
Entry and seedings for the nine Masters Series tournaments are governed by the world rankings and when the draw was made yesterday, Murray might have regretted dropping four places to No 20 after failing to win a match in his past two tournaments. The top 16 seeds here were all given byes into the second round.
With 18 of the world's top 20 in the 48-strong field (the injured Lleyton Hewitt and Radek Stepanek are the only absentees), Murray was no doubt grateful to find himself paired with a qualifier, Ivan Navarro Pastor, in the opening round. The 24-year-old Spaniard, ranked No 129 in the world, generally plays on the Challenger circuit but has won two of his last three tournaments, both on clay."