In a post from last summer I stated that I thought Andy Murray would be a grand slam winner in the not too distant future. His form in the Australian open so far has done nothing to make me change my mind. He’s looked formidable in every match he’s played and is now to play Rafael Nadal in the quarter finals.

Unfortunately, a certain Roger Federer is also looking in very good form, particularly during his 3 set dismantling of Lleyton Hewitt. There is nothing Murray can do about the way Federer is playing and he has to ensure that he gives no credence to things that are outside of his control. All focus should be on the parts of the game he has influence over, namely how he plays and approaches the game.

I once had a rugby coach that used to say ‘concentrate on the performance and the result will look after itself’. The number of tries and points we could score was influenced by external factors; the other team. However, we knew that if we executed our set piece the way we wanted, made our tackles and played our quick offload game with limited errors we would win. A common example of the opposite can be seen every saturday on match of the day. It always makes me laugh when I see football managers blaming the referee after a game for their loss. By blaming an ‘external locus of causality’, it takes the result out of his players’ hands and actually serves to reduce their intrinsic motivation (the will to something because you want to, rather than because of some external reward).

If Murray sees the result as an internal locus of causality, or in his own hands, then my status as fortune teller could well be cemented.

For 13 years now, since Tim Henman broke into the top 30, British tennis fans have had high hopes of being able to celebrate a grand slam winner.    In Andy Murray I think we have that winner.   He is without doubt a very talented tennis player, a trait he shares with a lot of players within the top 50, but something has set Murray apart these last few years that has led him to rise through the rankings amongst these other players.

The LTA has had a big part to play, they have invested heavily in the last couple of years developing a world class talent identification and long term athlete development pathway.   This, I’m sure, will bare fruit in the next few years despite the criticism they received after performances at Wimbledon in the summer.  They have a fantastic facility at the national tennis centre in Roehampton and have a very talented sport science support team in place there and it is from this that Andy Murray has been able to benefit.

The one facet many commentators on the game discuss is his fitness, or more specifically his strength and conditioning.  He has developed a bigger serve which he is able to hit very consistently throughout the whole match, his ground-strokes are very powerful and his movement around the court is quick and clinical which allows him to execute the rest of his game very effectively.  His s&c coach, Jez Green, should take a bow.   Not only have these gains come relatively quickly, but they have done without his competition performance suffering, no mean feat with a tour tennis player where you’re not sure what facilities you will have access to week on week.  I know the work and effort Murray must’ve put in is huge and I don’t underestimate it for a second.  But I also know the work and effort needed to get those gains as a coach is huge, that too shouldn’t be underestimated.

With Wimbledon well under way the nation has now pinned it’s hopes on the single remaining challenger for the title, Andy Murray.  All other British contenders, bar one, were out in the first round.   This was followed by the predictable barrage from the media aimed at all and sundry who they perceived to be at fault for this poor showing. The BBC interviewed a raft of former players asking for their thoughts on the problem with British tennis.   They duly gave their expert opinion that there weren’t enough tennis courts, players weren’t hungry enough or that they came from too wealthy backgrounds (not done Britain’s rowers too much harm).   My opinion is that these players should give their expert opinion on their expertise…hitting tennis balls.   Very few people, it would seem, have any knowledge on long term athlete development (LTAD), how it works and the time it takes to implement.

The difficulty with tennis is that once you get to a certain age, there is very little time to do anything besides play tennis.  Competitions must be played to achieve rankings points, if you don’t win many games you have to play more to gain the points which often means a relentless stream of competitions.   There are very few periods where a player can focus on specific conditioning gains, between tennis, traveling and recovery.   The majority of players out in the early stages this time round are already caught in that cycle, Andy Murray being the exception as he has a S&C coach that travels with him.   What is now being achieved is the identification of talent based on key physical performance indicators, not just how well they can hit a ball.   The kids then are coached by quality S&C coaches who know the value of the development of fundamental movement skills that are essential to success in the sport.

The time factor is an issue, the best time to develop these movement patterns are at a young age, and not 16-17 years olds which is what the press identifies as the future talent. 8, 10, 12 years old is the time at which movements are developed quickest and for the long term.   Assuming that the 3 year figure of increased funding for the LTA being banded around by the press is true, give a minimum 1 year to allow for design of the LTAD program which means that the program has been running for 2 years now.   The players who were 12 at the time of starting are now 14, they’re the ones who will determine the success of the LTA’s new structure not the crop of 29 year olds who haven’t gotten past the first round in 8 attempts.  Unfortunately the short termist attitude of the press will not accept this and calls are being made for funding cuts and reviews.   Reviews are conducted retrospectively, not at the beginning of a project.   I wonder if a long term journalist development plan could be introduced to allow for less lazy and more insightful and accurate writing by the sporting press…..