Great Day for Britain
6/01/2010
By Nikki Brown
GREAT Britain was triumphant over Germany with Andy Murray winning his singles match and then teaming up with Laura Robson to win the mixed doubles.
Neither seems able to agree if Murray is carrying Robson in the mixed doubles or whether the 15-year-old is actually covering the court well. On Monday, Murray was certain he covered more of the court and yesterday Robson said it was her. This time Murray didn’t say anything but that she “played well.”
The two have formed a close relationship here in Australia but are still yet to practice together. The pair have known each other for just over a year and after Monday’s mixed doubles match he asked his playing partner to join him for the 2012 London Olympic Games. She declined. However yesterday she decided to think about it.
Robson started out really strong in the opening set against No. 22 German Sabine Lisicki taking the match to a tie-break. However the youngster was outplayed in the second set.
Murray slumped a little bit in the first set, he was 4-1 up and allowed Germany’s Philip Kohlschreiber to get back into the match before the Scot could close out the set 6-4.
Murray came to the Hyundai Hopman Cup in order to gain match practice and even though each of his singles games have gone for just over an hour, playing the mixed doubles straight after offers almost continuous play.
On the flip side Murray does not want to be out on court too much and burn out before the Australian Open.
“Well it’s just spending time on court that you want. Because we go out straight to play the mixed, you do spend about two and-a-half hours on court. The other day it was a little bit longer, it was close to three hours I was on the court for,” Murray said.
“It’s enough, I don’t want to be playing loads. It’s really hot here so you want to give yourself a bit of time to get used to the conditions before you go out there and play four or five hours.
“I did enough fitness work. I know if I wanted to play for four or five hours that’s fine, but I’ll practice enough the next couple of weeks to feel good.”
Murray has been working on changing his game plan to play more shots at the net and today that worked well.
“I came forward a lot and it worked well when I came forward. I’ll practice it more in the next match and try and make sure it’s sound going into the tournament.”
Murray also noted the tennis balls played a huge effect on the game against Kohlschreiber.
“When you get new balls, they’re so much quicker. After a few games the court is really rough and they slow down a lot,” he said.
“I started serving really well with the new balls and then as the first set progressed, I started serving and missing a lot more first serves in the net. I just felt like the conditions got much slower and then when I got the new balls I started playing differently.”
Murray changed his racquet which improved his ball strike. He had not played a match in over a month before coming here and puts it down to a lack of match play.
“When I practice you just kind of change balls whenever you feel like you need to change balls. Whereas in the matches obviously it’s only seven or nine games,” he said.
“I haven’t played a match in five or six weeks so it’s probably just that. The Wilson balls are quick but then they do slow down a lot so it just takes a bit of time to get used to it.”
Robson will have a tough singles match on Friday against Russian star Elena Dementieva and she is looking forward to the opportunity to play the world’s No. 5.
“It’s just going to be a really good experience because she’s something like four or five in the world, so I’ve got nothing to lose really,” Robson said.
“I can just relax and play nice flowing tennis. I usually play better against better people. That’s just how it goes really.”
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