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MUTUA MADRID OPENMay 10, 2015Andy MurrayMADRID, SPAIN A. MURRAY/R. Nadal THE MODERATOR: Questions, please. Q. Usually you don't beat Rafa on clay. What happened today? You had won in Madrid before. ANDY MURRAY: Well, I played Rafa a number of times on clay, and I've actually played some good matches against him, like in Rome last year. I played at the French Open a few years ago. I lost, but I played good match with him. Monte‑Carlo I played well against him. So I played good matches, but just haven't managed to win. I think today I was just more consistent. I think in the second set Rafa was starting to play better at the beginning of the second, the middle part of the second set. But I stayed strong in that period of the match and he started to make some mistakes at the end that he wouldn't normally make. That obviously helped me finish the match. Q. You haven't lost since you got married. Did you have to be a happily married man to beat Rafa on clay, and do you think you can continue in the clay court season? ANDY MURRAY: I don't know. I mean, I think people don't always appreciate that sports people have, there is another part of our lives that is very important as well to performance. If you're happy away from the court and you're sort of your private and personal life is good, that will help everything. Helps your mindset; helps the way that you train; everything. So that is obviously for me is very good right now. That obviously helps performance, but also you still need to put in the hard work as well, which I did in Barcelona and Munich before here. I've been rewarded for that. Q. After so many years of trying, just how good does it feel where you're sitting right now sitting as champion over Rafa? ANDY MURRAY: Yeah, obviously it's nice. I think I wasn't expecting this a couple of weeks ago, so when things are unexpected, it feels nicer. I didn't feel like I put too much pressure on myself the last couple of weeks, which is a good thing. But, yeah, obviously to win a Masters Series on clay for me is a step in the right direction. It's something I had never done before. So that's good progress there. Yeah, obviously to win against Rafa on clay in a final in Spain is extremely difficult thing to do, and I'm proud that I've managed to do that. Q. As you said, you played Rafa so many times on clay. What did you think about his game today? Do you feel it was the usual Rafa on clay, or did you see that something was maybe missing compared to the other years? ANDY MURRAY: I think for me there were periods in the match where he played like he usually does, but there were also periods where he made more mistakes, like I explained at the beginning. The last game, for example, the last two returns of the match, one he missed long by three or four meters, and the next one he hit right into the bottom of the net. That for him is unusual. But there were periods of the match where we did play a lot of long rallies and he started defending a lot better. When he was able to dictate points with his forehand he's still playing extremely well. Yeah, he did make more mistakes than he usually does. Also feel like I started the match very well. I think when someone is maybe not that confident, you know, I won like I think 12 out of the first 13 or 14 points. That immediately puts you on the back foot. That was important for me today. Q. How much of an affect as Amélie had on your clay game, because it's improved drastic clay to, say, 12 months ago? ANDY MURRAY: Yeah, I think since I started working with her, which was after Wimbledon last year, I think I just dropped outside the top 10. Now I'm back at 3 in the world. Obviously this year for me I've been healthy. I think that's a big thanks to all of my team. Obviously Amélie, but my physical trainers and physios for putting in a lot of hard work and making some pretty drastic changes to the way I've trained and tried to understand my body better so that I could stay healthy for longer, and especially on this surface, which I hadn't done the last two or three years. Really struggled physically on the clay. Yeah, big thanks to all of my team for actually accepting, okay, you felt really bad on the clay. What are the reasons for that and what can we do to make you feel better? They've done a great job. Yeah, obviously Amélie has been influential in that, but also the rest of my team as well for being brave enough to actually make changes. Yeah, I feel much better because of it. Q. Rafa has won nine French Opens. Do you still consider him as the favorite there? ANDY MURRAY: I mean, he's obviously one of the favorites. I think that court there, I mean, he's lost one match on that court in his whole career. So, yeah, I mean, there is no doubt that when the French Open comes round that he'll be one the favorites. Maybe it's closer than it has been in previous years, but I wouldn't write him off. There was enough this week to suggest with another couple more good weeks of playing in Rome, if he has some good results there and has a good week preparing in Roland Garros, no reason why he can't go all the way at the French Open. Q. Apparently you were looking at the ATP website while the video presentation was going on. What were you looking at? ANDY MURRAY: Just looking at the stats from the match. I have the little app on my phone, so I was just looking at some of the stats. When you literally just finish you don't remember everything that's happened. It's sometimes good just to see‑‑ you obviously get asked about it immediately after when you do the interviews, so it's sometimes good just to have an idea of actually what things went well. And you can feel like you served great and look at the stats and the percentage is really low or, you know, you could be wrong. So I was just looking at the stats of the match to see what things had gone well. Q. How much do you attribute Munich to this win? Obviously it's a lower event, but it's the first time you've been to a clay court event and left without actually losing. I imagine in a sport where you lose most weeks, must feel different. And also just about the stats, you won 81% of your second serves against Rafa today. I guess that must be near personal best for you. ANDY MURRAY: Yeah, I definitely served a bit differently on the second serve today, which, yeah, obviously helped. That's something that on a clay court Rafa is normally extremely high in that statistic. Yeah, that would have been the main difference really in the match. Munich definitely helped, but it also had some drawbacks too, because we obviously finished on the Monday. It was an extremely long match, and followed by playing the last match on Wednesday. So I'm very happy with how I handled all of the, I don't know, things that went on really the last ten days or so. It's been tough mentally and physically quite draining and tiring. Although some of matches like today wasn't extremely long and my match against Kei wasn't extremely long, but a lot of late finishes. So, yeah, I've handled that well. Munich was also a step in the right direction. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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