“Ivan Lendl can help Murray in improving his game”, believes Tony Roche – Tennis News
Australian legend, Tony Roche, has the opinion that Andy Murray’s coach, Ivan Lendl, can help the Brit in winning a Grand Slam and take him to new heights.
Roche, who himself is a former world number eight, coached Lendl and guided him to Grand Slam glory.
Lendl consoled Murray on the phone after the Brit was unable to win his opening match, losing to world number 92, Guillermo Garcia-Lopez of Spain, in the second round at the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells last week.
The Brit faced his second loss in four days, as Murray Brothers could not go past the second round of the doubles event, getting beaten by second seeds Max Mirnyi and Daniel Nestor.
Roche said, "I don't think Ivan will be panicking. He realises everybody has tough losses at some stage. You've just to get on with the next tournament."
Lendl, who is considered one of the greatest players of all time, had a similar start to his career. The 52-year-old could not win any of the first four Grand Slam finals he reached. Nevertheless, he went on to win eight Majors
and entered his name in record books.
Murray has already lost three finals. He has got beaten twice by Roger Federer and once by Novak Djokovic in the title matches.
Roche said, “I think it's a good appointment by Andy because I think there's a lot of similarity there. It took Ivan a long time before he won his first slam. He had a lot of disappointments.”
"I'm sure he can help him prepare with that, with the disappointment of losing slams and having that tag of maybe being the best player not to have won a slam, so I think he's good for Andy in that regard because he's been through
it and he knows what it takes."
However, it can be judged that Murray’s performance has improved after the Brit appointed Lendl as his coach.
Currently ranked fourth in the world, Murray reached the last four at the Australian Open earlier this year. He thrashed Djokovic in the semi-finals at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships two weeks ago.
It is pertinent to note that, last year, Murray got defeated in three straight matches after losing to Novak Djokovic in the Australian Open final. Those three included first round losses at the BNP Paribas Open and Sony Ericsson
Open.
The Brit will be hoping that it does not happen this year, as he takes part at the Sony Ericsson Open in Miami.
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