LONDON, July 5 |
LONDON, July 5 (Reuters) – Andy Murray needs to ditch the
‘Mr Nice Guy’ image and become more arrogant, brash and
big-headed if he has aspirations of becoming Wimbledon champion,
according to Goran Ivanisevic.
Expectations that this might be the year that Britain’s
great tennis hope ends a 76-year wait for a men’s grand slam
champion has been gathering momentum since 10.04 pm local time
last Thursday when Murray’s Wimbledon bogeyman Rafa Nadal was
sensationally jettisoned from the 2012 championships.
Murray is much too polite to say it himself, but Nadal’s
unexpected demise should have been a cause for celebration for
the Briton.
For not only had Nadal enjoyed a commanding 13-5 win-loss
record against Murray, the Spaniard also shattered the British
number one’s Wimbledon dreams all three times they have met on
the hallowed turf.
With two of those losses coming in the 2010 and 2011
semi-finals, it is little wonder the fans cramming around
sweltering Court Nine during Murray’s practice session on
Thursday 24 hours before his semi-final against Jo-Wilfried
Tsonga were quick to remind him: “Come on Andy, it’s now or
never!”
Unsurprisingly, the man who admitted that “subconsciously
I’m probably extremely stressed out right now” chose to ignore
the cries and carried on with his drill of fine-tuning his
serves, overheads and volleys under the watchful eye of coach
Ivan Lendl.
Ivanisevic believes there is more than a little bit of the
‘crazy Goran’ in Murray as he gives rivals – especially Novak
Djokovic, Nadal and Roger Federer – way too much respect.
THREE OCCASIONS
It is the reason why on the three occasions Murray has made
it to a major final – 2008 U.S. Open and 2010/2011 Australian
Opens – he has failed to win a set.
“I needed to be more arrogant on court. I had too much
respect for everybody. For (Boris) Becker, for (Andre) Agassi,
for (Pete) Sampras, for (Jim) Courier. I even had respect for
the guy ranked 100,” Ivanisevic, who overcame the heartache of
losing three finals before finally conquering Mount Wimbledon in
2001, told Reuters in an interview.
“That’s why I like Djokovic. He doesn’t respect anybody on
the court. He’s great. Even when he was young, he thought he was
going to number one one day, and he became number one. Whereas I
was always happy being number two behind Sampras… maybe if I
thought I could be number one, I wouldn’t have lost so many
matches,” Ivanisevic added.
“I’ve seen many of my matches against Sampras and 60 percent
of those were a gift. I gave him those matches and they were big
matches, semis, finals. I was good in the semi-finals. I had bad
bad record in the finals.
“It is the same for Murray. In a final and semis Murray has
to take chances because against these guys, he can’t wait for
them to miss as they are never going to miss. He has to make
them miss and he has to put the pressure on them.”
On Wednesday, after reaching the All England Club semis for
a fourth successive year, Murray bleated: “I’d be disappointed
if I lost before the final.”
Murray’s observation set off alarm bells in Ivanisevic,
especially since if the British fourth seed gets to the final,
he will have to face Djokovic or Federer.
“I played much better tennis in the semi-finals because I
thought it was bad to lose in the semis but not so bad to lose
in the final, which is very stupid thinking,” said the popular
Croatian.
“I would think ‘ok, I was in the final, not bad’ but nobody
gives a shit for the runner-up. I have three plates from
Wimbledon, they are beautiful plates nobody cares and nobody
remembers. And it’s unbelievable how many people remember 2001.
“I should have been more aggressive to win the titles but
was too polite. I was too mixed up.”
(Editing by Ed Osmond)
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