US OPEN

August 30, 2006

Andy Murray

THE MODERATOR: First question, please.

Q. Your thoughts on that, Andy?
ANDY MURRAY: Yeah, I thought it was good. I knew it was gonna be difficult. You know, he hits the ball pretty hard. He's got a big serve. He's pretty flashy. Can hit some big winners.
But, you know, if you can keep enough balls in court and deep, you know, he can get a bit impatient and start making mistakes.
But second set, I'm gonna say he hit at least 20 winners in that set. I couldn't have done much about it. I thought I played pretty well apart from that.

Q. Is that frustrating when someone is climbing all over your second serve like that?
ANDY MURRAY: No, not really. You know, it doesn't happen very often in matches where someone, you know, does do that. And that's the way that he plays, you know, he goes for shots that are not really on. I mean, like he did, you know, he can do it for, you know, a set, two sets. But to keep it up over five sets is really difficult. You know, he started to get a little bit tired towards the end.
When you play high risk tennis like that, you know, the law of averages says that he's gonna play two or three bad sets out of six. It's difficult to maintain a standard like that.

Q. Had some bad calls, didn't you?
ANDY MURRAY: Uhm...

Q. One that made the mark two inches out.
ANDY MURRAY: I mean, they weren't great. But, I mean, you know, I wasn't expecting unbelievable calls. I was playing against an American in America. If you were playing in Italy and, you know, it was an Italian referee or whatever, it's always going to be a little bit a few bad calls.
I didn't have a problem with, you know, if they miss a call on the line. But when you're overruling balls on the far sideline, like three times I think he did it, and then he misses two, one ace and one of my second serve aces which was 85 miles an hour maybe, and a backhand down the line that's right in front of him, you know, that's when it's a little bit annoying.

Q. How frustrating is it, you've been playing, I don't know, the last three tournaments with HawkEye always on your court, then all of a sudden you go on to a court and it's not there? Does it get a bit frustrating?
ANDY MURRAY: No, I think it evens itself out. But just, you know, you can maybe get some calls, you know, bad calls at the wrong stages of a match, breakpoint.
You know, but it's not I've been used to playing without HawkEye for the last ten years of my life. So, uhm, it's just a nice thing to have on the court. It doesn't really make too much difference, but it's just nice to have so you can feel better in yourself. Even if the ball's out that you questioned or whatever, it's just nicer to know if the ball was actually in or not because some of those balls I thought were out, and the umpire was overruling a few and also not calling some. That's the thing that makes it a bit difficult.

Q. You became a bit frustrated, but it didn't really affect you too much, which is the key really, isn't it? Made decent shots after.
ANDY MURRAY: I don't think it I don't remember shouting in anger once during the match. I didn't throw my racquet. I didn't get frustrated really. If I had done, I would have let it affect me more. Even though I went a break down in the third set, I still came back. I wasn't getting too angry out there because I knew that's I knew what to expect. Just whether he could keep it up for, you know, three sets in a row, which he obviously wasn't able to do.
But I didn't get too frustrated today.

Q. Can you consciously recognize points where you might have lost your (indiscernible) before, and if so, what's different now?
ANDY MURRAY: Well, I think I've always been quite emotional on the court. I just think the last year I've started to deal with things much, much better. I don't get too upset on the court now. You know, I try to keep my emotions a little bit more in check.
Today was a really important match for me. And, you know, I was getting quite fired up. It is my favorite tournament. I want to perform well here. You know, even though things maybe in the past might have affected me, before I always fought until the end of matches. It wasn't like I stopped trying. I just got a little bit frustrated and maybe stopped thinking as well as I could have done.
Whereas now, when I get frustrated, I put it out of my mind a bit quicker and I keep thinking, whereas before maybe I would have started to play a bit stupid.

Q. Let it go quicker?
ANDY MURRAY: Yeah, yeah.

Q. There was a call at 4 3 in the third set.
ANDY MURRAY: The backhand, yeah, yeah. I didn't say anything afterwards. Just, you know, sometimes you have to go up to the umpire and tell him because those sort of calls are the ones that, you know, can change matches a little bit, especially on breakpoint when I think once I won that game, it was quite obvious that he was starting to get tired and was struggling a little bit.
So, you know, maybe if he'd managed to, you know, hold on to his serve that game, you know, like he did at 5 Love or 5 3 sorry, 5 2, he hit four clean winners on my serve to break me, you know, he could have played a game like that at 4 All and maybe it's a different match.
But once I won that game, he started to get pretty tired.

Q. Were you getting a bit of stick from the fans?
ANDY MURRAY: Uhm... Well, no, I was laughing at them at the start of the match. They said, you know one of them said to me, You're going down, Murray. They were saying stuff when I was sitting down at the change of ends like, you know, Robby, you've got him, Robby, you're gonna do this, Murray's got nothing and stuff. I was just like, Let's see at the end of the match.
You know, it's a little bit annoying when people are kind of saying it. I know maybe they were just doing it to maybe it was for fun or maybe they were trying to put me off. But, you know, it was obviously his camp that were doing it.

Q. Why is it your favorite tournament?
ANDY MURRAY: It's the best one because the atmosphere is different to all the other Grand Slams. You get I mean, my court was absolutely packed tonight, and I don't even know what the time is, but it's dark. You know, it's late. If you saw last night, even though it was raining until 9:00, loads of fans were staying around trying to see the night match.
You know, there's always things to do. You know, there's drummers here. There's people singing. There's a really nice food court. I like the night matches. Everything about the US Open just makes it my favorite tournament. It matches my personality the best.

Q. The sort of thing people are saying, you're seen as the guy who has just beaten Federer. Are people's attitudes toward you changing because you're a seeded player, more things are expected of you?
ANDY MURRAY: I think I got asked this question quite a lot at the start of the year because I broke through last year. I got asked, Do you think you're now going to be one of the players that people are going to be gunning for? You know, it's not really changed that much. I think it's even better now that I am ranked 19 in the world, in the top 20 and getting seeded. Because whereas players maybe come on court with more respect for you whereas before they might not have respected you as much, maybe not be nervous going on the court against you, whereas now maybe it's a different story.

Q. Greg has come in tonight and said that he'll play the Davis Cup in the Ukraine if selected, then it's almost certain he'll hang up the racquet after that. You've spoke many times about the influence Tim has had on you. Can you talk about what Greg's influence has been?
ANDY MURRAY: Greg's got one of the strongest characters in tennis. You know, he's come back, you know, from, you know, really serious drugs allegation where he dropped out of the top hundred. You know, he's been someone that's kind of he's a perfect example of someone who's got the most out of the game.
He's been a great player almost. He's made final of a Slam, been No. 4 in the world, won Masters Series, won 15 titles. He's done a lot in tennis. He's someone guys have to look at and say he's got the most out of his game, he's remained positive through times where a lot of guys would have turned negative. He's someone that you can look at and say, you know, he's had a really good career and someone that, you know, he's remained positive when a lot of other guys may have thrown in the towel earlier.
To come back, when you've been as high as 4 in the world, to drop out of the top 150, then to get back inside, I think he was seeded, or really high, made the semis of a Masters Series last year, he's achieved a lot in tennis. He's come back from things that a lot of people thought he might not have done.

Q. He's always been very supportive and good to you, as well?
ANDY MURRAY: Yeah, Greg's like that. He's a very kind guy. He doesn't have a bad thing to say about anyone. He doesn't have a bad bone in his body. He's someone that, you know, when I first came on the tour, you know, I practiced with him a lot, I spoke to him a lot. You know, he's someone he's just a really positive guy. If you go to him and ask him a question on something, he's definitely not giving you a negative answer. He always looks for the positive in everything. Kind of like Brad in a way. He speaks a lot, as well.

Q. How big a loss is he to the Davis Cup squad?
ANDY MURRAY: Uhm, well, if you I mean, I think it's quite obvious that he's going to be missed because, you know, he's been on the Davis Cup team for a little over ten years maybe now.

Q. Eleven.
ANDY MURRAY: You know, he's got so much experience. He's played so many Davis Cup matches. He's won some big matches. He's lost some tough ones. You know, it's tough to replace someone with as much experience as him. Unfortunately, right now, there's not as many guys coming through. So when Greg does stop, you got to look at the positive side and the negative side: We're gonna miss someone that's got loads of experience and has been a great player the last ten years, or you can see the positive and see that we're gonna have young guys playing, getting really good experience in Davis Cup, guys that are gonna be on the team for the next eight, nine years hopefully.
You know, I think that's exciting for me anyway, and I'm sure for a lot of the other guys like Josh. I saw he was two sets down. I don't know what his final score was.

Q. He lost in four.
ANDY MURRAY: You know, he's qualified for two Grand Slams in a row. Although he's not won a match, it's still a good effort to do that. His ranking is going up, you know. We got Jimmy Baker, Josh Goodall. My brother's been doing well in doubles. You know, we could have a good team in the future. But, you know, it's gonna take a little bit of time. And it's important that people don't expect too much too soon of the team because these guys don't have much experience that are going to be playing in the next few matches.

Q. Can you talk about your next match.
ANDY MURRAY: Who am I playing?

Q. Di Mauro.
ANDY MURRAY: Yeah, I actually lost against him 2 1 a year and a half ago. He's a lefty, really solid player. Obviously, it's you know, I'm playing much better than I was at that stage. But, you know, he's gonna be a difficult guy to beat. He doesn't make too many mistakes. He can run all day. He's got a lot of experience.
But hopefully, if I play like I did today and have been the last few weeks, I should be okay to win that one.

Q. What do you remember of that match last year against him?
ANDY MURRAY: I got a pretty bad beating. I made a lot of mistakes. He didn't make any mistakes. You know, it was on clay, his best surface. You know, I at that stage had maybe played four challengers. He probably played about 204. You know, he was just better than me then, and I didn't have much experience. I think he might even be 30 now. He's quite old. So, you know, it's gonna be a difficult match. But when I played him the last time, he won pretty comfortably.

Q. Where was that?
ANDY MURRAY: It was in Barletta in the second round of a challenger there. I lost. You know, it was 6 2, 6 1. Was not very good.

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