Andy Murray and the Monkeys

Ah not the cheese pop group from the 60's.

The dust is now starting to settle. Mrs LK being Scottish herself has given me the Sean Connery school of thought "His is Scottish, not British you hanger on!" even if a small part of me agrees with that thought, I would still support him regardless.

Now I have managed to pinch myself and get the fog of celebrations out of my head I look forward. Andy for time has had 2 monkeys on his back. The spirit of Fred Perry and the 76 year curse and also the best player never to win a Slam. In one foul swoop he has managed to put to rest those Monkeys.

I ask now what can Andy achieve? There is no longer that pressure. There is a different pressure of being a contender for Slam success from here on in, but I feel that pressure is not as intense as the previous Monkeys. The British press will take delight in calling him US Open champion and Slam winner. The belief is there now. He can go in to press conferences now and say 'I can win it' and not face questions about the British drought. Quite interestingly now the pressure is shared. I know CC raised on another thread that Laura Robson has now taken some of the column inches away from Andy with her recent exploits, but now Andy is a Slam winner it is going to become a lot cooler now with the pressure from the outer circles.

Question I have is will we see a more confident assured Andy on court?

Also will his concentration lapses become less frequent?

WTF does Connery think he's achieving with that sort of idiocy? If the man hadn't spent so much time away from that part of the World perhaps he'd have less of a guilt complex and need to waffle on about it all the time. Silly old fool.

Anyway, as I like to remind people, there is no such thing as Scotland, or Englad. These are just imaginary constructs and in the real world there's just land, and people wandering around it stepping over these "lines" willy nilly.

Well I am sure he won't be going back to Scotland any time soon and if Scotland do become independent, then I am very sure he won't go back to help with the massive defecit of debt they will be saddled with

I agree we are from the same island.

Two things:

a. The outside pressure on Andy will never again be anything like it has been these last 5 years - pressure will be there, and he'll have to put it on himself if he's going to reach No. 1 or win repeat slams, but he's bridged the chasm of real importance in tennis at an age when he's well able to take it in his stride.

b. Sean Connery is an embarrassing tool - happy to take a Knighthood, but not happy to pay taxes.

I think Knighthoods doled out just for being a success at your chosen occupation without doing more are embarrassing - the way I look at it is that if Mr. Marlon Brando or Mr. Robert De Niro is good enough for them, it's good enough to be Mr. Sean Connery.

Same for sport - I hope one day in the future we don't see Sir Andy Murray playing Mr. Roger Federer or Mr. Raphael Nadal on the seniors tour - that is unless Andy does something extraordinary outside his tennis career for which a Knighthood is merited, then I'd be delighted of course.

I wouldn't like to use "monkeys" - I'll use journo's.

If you think the journo's are going to take it easy with Murray - you're wrong. They are now asking
a) Murray can you go on to dominate the game?
b) Will you be abe to defend your US Open?
c) Will you be abe to get to No 1 in the rankings?
d) Will you be a one slam wonder or can you go on to win more slam titles?
e) How many slams will you win before you retire?
f) When will you win your first clay court title?
g) When will you win Wimbledon?
f) Are you better than Michael Chang?

etc etc

@NS - they may well ask such questions, but with one caveat it won't put Murray under anything like the same pressure as "(when) will you win your first slam?". He's got his feet under the most important desk in tennis and now that place in the game is secured for good he can bat such questions back with a sang froid that he could never muster whilst he was slamless.

The one caveat is Wimbledon - "(when) will you win Wimbledon?" is a question with the potential to put the pressure on because Murray is a Brit, but nothing like "(when) will you win your first slam?"

All this goes to show how good it is to have Lendl in his corner - Lendl knows all about the pressure of wanting to win Wimbledon, just as he knew all about the pressure of winning his first slam after 4 defeats in finals. He'll be good for Murray's next stage too. After Lendl's first slam win RG 1984 (when he was 24 - pretty similar age to Murray) he lost the next two slam finals he contested, making him 1-6 in slam finals - his next slam win was not until USO 1985. RG 1984 was in Mac's most dominant year so Lendl also had to wait a while before he truly emerged as the main man on tour. He's seen it all from a pretty similar perspective to that currently facing Murray. I truly think this win has the capacity to change Murray's life quite enormously for the better; I very much hope for him it will.

Fair points Barry

The biggest "monkey" on his back was the lack of a slam title. The fact that a British male hadn't won it for 76 years amplified the size of that "monkey".

It is said that the fact that some of the womens No. 1's lacked a slam ultimately destroyed them psychologically. They buckled under the pressure to dissappear out of the top twenty, or tried so hard in training they ended up with chronic injuries and out of professional tennis altogether. Dinara Safina is one example losing three finals in the 2008 and 2009 period.

I'm sure that this US Open title will not be the last major Murray wins -the monkey on the back and the insane British media must have felt very heavy to carry.

Agree that Sean Connery is a complete ar*e. It would be nice if he is so passionately and narrowly nationalistic, that he did his bit by residing north of the border and paying taxes. Luckily Murray and his camp seem to be a little less (conveniently when it suits) xenophobic than SC- it's not really the message that global sponsors want to promote.

barrystar wrote:
Same for sport - I hope one day in the future we don't see Sir Andy Murray playing Mr. Roger Federer or Mr. Raphael Nadal on the seniors tour - that is unless Andy does something extraordinary outside his tennis career for which a Knighthood is merited, then I'd be delighted of course.

Hmm really. Should I go through a whole list of sportsmen knighted who I'd say have not achieved what Andy has? There are enough of those I can tell you. In any case, any knighthood coming Andy's way hopefully won't come until he retires from the sport.

Murray said after the match:

"I've been asked most days for the last 4 or 5 years 'when are you going to win a slam?' and getting reminded of the 76 years. It was really starting to get to me earlier this year. Some people would try and be really nice and say 'you'll win the next one' which made it worse. Now, I'll never be asked that question again and that's a nice feeling"

You can almost hear the weight being lifted off his shoulders as you read those words. Andy has done the really difficult part, and I believe we'll see more confidence from now on.

The only way is up for him now. In my opinion, he'll win Wimbledon next year.