Andy Murray revealed on Wednesday night he has been coached from the stands during a match – although he was totally unaware of it until afterwards.
On the eve his second match at these championships – against Robin Haase first-up on Court No 1 on Thursday – the Scot has entered the rolling debate on coaches illegally signalling tactics and advice to their players and, typically, he comes at it from an odd angle. He would not be drawn into criticising other players but told a story from his teenage days in Spain that shines an interesting light on a serious subject.
“I wouldn’t want to speak about other players because I don’t know,” he said, “but when I was a junior, one of the coaches Pato [Álvarez] that I used to work with used to do signals to a lot of his players.
“I was playing a futures tournament when I was about 16 out in Spain. I won the match but it was close, not a very good match. And he went: ‘Andy, what are you doing? You never listen to me when you are on the court.’
“I said: ‘What do you mean?’ He said: ‘I was telling you to serve and volley and you weren’t doing it.’ I was, like: ‘You never told me what the signals were.’
“He was there at the back of the court telling me what to do and I didn’t know. He is the only coach that I have ever worked with [to do that]. Since I have been on the tour none of the coaches I have been with have ever given me any hand signals, or anything like that.
“Ivan Lendl didn’t say a word, really, when I was playing matches and, no, I have not had that since I have been on the tour. I don’t think I have ever had a coaching warning. It’s possible but I don’t think so.”
He might not need anything more than encouragement against Haase, whom he has beaten three times out of four, but he will hardly disregard the danger posed by a player who has taken a set off him in each of their two US Open matches.
“I was cramping after an hour and 15 minutes [when they last played there, in the first round last year]. Idon’t know how I managed to come through that match, to be honest. The time when I played him before in New York [in 2011], he was coming in to it having played very well.”
Murray and Haase have slightly differing recollections of their history, the Dutchman saying he never played him as a junior, while the Scot does remember him being around at that time of their development.
“He is someone I grew up with, in juniors and stuff like that. He likes playing on the big courts as well. He goes for it, which makes things tough. I don’t know him unbelievably well. He is quiet off the court, but on it he is quite loud and open and emotional. So it should be a fun match.”
Murray says he has been turning to the snooker table to relax between matches, alongside Ross Hutchins and the Delgado brothers, a habit he picked up during his spells of rehab after injury, when he would play his Davis Cup captain, Leon Smith, in Glasgow. “We get pumped to play,” he says of his time on the tables at the All England Club. “None of us is any good but it is a fun way to spend time with friends.”
Aljaz Bedene and James Ward, meanwhile, have the incentive of moving closer to an all-British fourth tie – if they can beat Viktor Troicki and Jiri Vesely, respectively. The newest Brit, Bedene, has the tougher task, up against the Queen’s semi-finalist who gave Murray a good argument. He revealed he had a brief phone conversation with his mother after beating Radek Stepanek in the first round.
“She was really happy and proud,” said Bedene, who was born in the old Yugoslavia before Ljubljana became the capital of independent Slovenia and was granted British citizenship in April. “But she cut the call short because she said I probably had a lot of work to do now. It was only five seconds, but they were really happy. They are on holiday – I think they followed it on the internet.”
Bedene, whose partner is the singer Kimalie, says he is being recognised more often in public lately – hopefully because of his tennis. “I was talking to Kimalie – who has been working with Jeff Wayne and they will probably be releasing a song or two this year – and she said: ‘Definitely next year it will be different for us,’ and I agree. I still don’t want to be too well-known. I want to be able to enjoy my personal life – but if it happens, you cannot do anything about it.”
Ward’s might be the more straightforward task against the lively young Czech left-hander Vesely, although he invariably views every match as a struggle – even his win over lucky loser Luca Vanni after the withdrawal through injury of David Ferrer.
But the Londoner did take heart from the presence of three other British players in the second round for the first time in 10 years.
“I think everyone’s picked their game up, playing well coming into the tournament,” he said. “Everyone’s ranking is improving. It’s good to have a few more guys playing well and winning matches. You just keep knocking at the door.”
