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BARCLAYS ATP WORLD TOUR FINALS

November 19, 2016

Andy Murray

London, England, United Kingdom

A. MURRAY/M. Raonic

5-7, 7-6, 7-6

THE MODERATOR: Questions, please.

Q. Raonic was saying earlier that the experience of yourself and Novak is the difference in those really tight moments. There were plenty of those this evening. Are you sort of conscious of that bank of experience you've had when you're really up against it, that that's what gets you through?
ANDY MURRAY: I mean, experiences can help in some ways and can be negative in some ways, as well. Maybe you know sort of the right shots to play, but you're more aware of the consequences of making those shots and also missing them, as well.

Especially towards the end of the matches, you know, sometimes the young players in those situations, they sort of go for shots without thinking. I think as you get older, the tendency is to think a little bit more.

It has positives and negatives - experience - I think.

Q. Obviously another very long match tonight. You quite often say that it's kind of the next day that you pay the price. Judging by how you feel now, how do you think you're going to feel tomorrow?
ANDY MURRAY: I don't know how I'll feel tomorrow. Obviously tired just now because it was a really hard match. It wasn't just that it was physically hard, it was mentally a tough match, too. It was pretty stressful.

I was quite far behind obviously in the second set. A set and a break down, managed to turn it round. Then it was back and forth in the third set.

The physical side, obviously the body is a bit sore after such a long match, but mentally it was tiring, too.

Q. Milos called this one of the best matches he has ever competed in physically. You've been in a lot of long matches. Where does this rank in that category?
ANDY MURRAY: I think for drama and stuff at the end of the match, I think it was pretty dramatic. Both of us had chances. In the tiebreak, I think we played some pretty good stuff in the tiebreak. I don't think it was, like, bad points that we were losing or bad shots we were losing. As points, I think we played some good stuff in the breaker.

But, yeah, I mean, it was one of the tougher matches I played this year. For sure it was not easy, for the reasons I gave, obviously with it being very long, but also mentally tiring as well. The nature of it was very up and down.

Q. I think you said 'big heart' to your team as you finished. You must have been proud of the way you handled the mental seesawing of the match.
ANDY MURRAY: Well, I fought really hard today, yeah. I fought hard. I fought very hard this week. I have also the last few months, too.

It would have been easy today when I was behind to have gone away a little bit, but I didn't. I fought hard. Even after serving for the match twice, having a bunch of match points in the tiebreak, still stayed tough, chased balls down, fought as best as I could. It was enough to get me the win.

Yeah, I was happy with that.

Q. What have you done since the match in terms of recovery, and what will your schedule look like tomorrow?
ANDY MURRAY: I don't know exactly for tomorrow. I'm practicing I think about 2:30. I don't know what I'll do yet in the morning. I'll try and probably sleep as late as possible.

Yeah, I did ice bath, stretched, had a massage from my physio. I'll do a little bit more stuff tonight, I would think, when I get back to the hotel.

Q. Ivan normally doesn't show a great deal of emotion courtside. Today he was getting very animated at certain stages in the match. Do you notice that? Does it have an impact on how you feel as well?
ANDY MURRAY: I didn't notice him being animated really. The rest of my box obviously are a bit more animated so I would notice that a little bit more.

But, yeah, I didn't notice that today from him. Maybe towards the end of the match, maybe a little bit more than usual. But I think that would be quite normal because of the way the match went.

Q. Since we are not tennis players, we hear always about this ice bath. Can you explain exactly what an ice bath is. It's a full bath of ice and you're freezing cold for 10 minutes? How does it work?
ANDY MURRAY: I was in for 10 minutes today, and it was 10 degrees Celsius. I normally have it between 8 to 12 degrees depending on how much ice we can get.

The one that's here, I mean, they're different. Some you get in and you stand in them. This one is basically like an inflatable one of the paddle pools you would put your kids in when it's hot outside in the summer. It's basically like that. It's just filled with water, then the ice to cool it down.

Q. Regardless of how you're feeling, does it make it any easier who you may be playing tomorrow as one last effort?
ANDY MURRAY: Obviously tomorrow is the last day for a while, get a break after that. I'll just give my best of what I've got tomorrow. Hopefully it's enough.

Q. You just mentioned you're going back to the hotel. At the start of the week you said you were going to commute from home. When did those plans change?
ANDY MURRAY: I stayed at home a few nights. If I played a late match, I would stay at the hotel, then practicing early at 8:30, then driving home around midday.

Obviously, tonight - I don't even know what the time is just now - but by the time I'm done doing all my stuff, yeah, just stay at the hotel. The point in going home to see my family and see my daughter... She's been sleeping about four hours ago. Not much to go back for.

Q. You could in theory end up No. 1 tonight. Would you be satisfied with that result were it to happen tonight? Secondly, the second half of the season, post Roland Garros, Lendl joined your team again. Could you reflect on his addition and your surge, and if it matters you didn't have to go through Djokovic that whole period.
ANDY MURRAY: Well, yeah, I mean, with Ivan, obviously we haven't actually spent loads of time together since the grass period. I've spent more time with Jamie. Obviously the grass season was really, really important part of the year for me, and Ivan helped a lot during that period.

I was pretty down after the French Open. We agreed to start working with each other a few days after the French Open. It was quite a big boost for me, that in itself, that he wanted to come back to work with me again.

Then obviously had the perfect grass court season. That gave me a lot of confidence. I've spoken about that a bunch the last few months, that winning a major competition again after a lot of tough losses was big for me.

Then, yeah, just played great really the last four or five months. My whole team's contributed towards that. But Ivan definitely came in a really important period of the year for me.

In terms of winning against Novak or beating Novak, you can only beat the players that are in front of you. I can't do any more than that. I've done that this week. I've beat three guys in the top five in the world, which some people were not happy that I hadn't won against the top five players. Then it will be the top two players, then top one. There's always something that's wrong with what you're doing.

The guys ahead of me have had that, as well. I'm sure with Novak, it's been like, Roger's injured or Rafa's injured.

You can only beat who you're playing against. I've done that the last few months.

Q. Obviously the atmosphere out there was extraordinary. When you're in the heat of battle, so much is going on, are you able to enjoy a match like that while it's happening or is it just too much happening to really enjoy anything that's going on on court?
ANDY MURRAY: Yeah, it's not that easy to enjoy matches whilst you're actually playing them. I'm not also hating matches whilst I'm playing them either. I don't know. You're just out there competing and trying to win. Obviously you get the enjoyment and the highs from winning, and obviously some losses are tougher than others. Had I lost tonight's match, I would have been pretty down.

When you're out there competing, the atmosphere helps for sure. Playing in front of a pretty packed crowd at this stage of the year definitely gives you an extra boost, you know, helps you to keep pushing right to the end.

But, yeah, I'm not disliking it when I'm out there, and I'm not really, really enjoying it, I'm just competing.

Q. You talked about the match being stressful. You had a warning when you had a chance to serve for the match. Is there a part of you that ever worries an incident like that might result in something worse than a warning? After a disappointment like that, especially after a match like that, how do you regather your focus to go again?
ANDY MURRAY: When I hit the ball into the thing?

Q. Ended up in the crowd.
ANDY MURRAY: Yeah, I mean, obviously if you hit balls into crowds, stuff like that, obviously you're close to getting defaulted. You have to be very, very careful with that. That's happened to my opponents this week, as well, and they didn't get warnings for hitting a ball up into the scoreboard.

I think for the players, you obviously just want the consistency there. But, yeah, if you're hitting balls into the crowd or anything like that, you deserve to be warned. Yeah, you know, it's up to the umpire, if you hit a ball into the crowd, if it hits someone, whether they default you or not.

Q. Tonight how hard was it to refocus after that moment when you thought you were about to cross the line?
ANDY MURRAY: Well, I think because of where you were in the match, the finish line's literally right there. It was probably a little bit easier.

If that was, like, say a best-of-five set match, that was the third set, probably would have been a bit harder because you know you still got a long way to go. You could potentially go two sets to one down. Because there was only five, six minutes of the match left, it was probably a bit easier.

At the same time, yeah, I mean, it turned out to be longer than five, six minutes. A pretty brutal, tough, tough tiebreak. But, yeah, I didn't find that too bad just 'cause we were so close to the end.

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