Andy Murray and Ivan Lendl are getting the band back together. Murray, who parted ways with long-time coach Jamie Delgado in December, will be reunited with his former mentor in Florida next month as the pair begin a long run-up to the grass-court season.
Murray and Lendl will begin working together after the Miami Open, with a strong showing at Wimbledon the target following the 34-year-old’s decision to skip the clay-court season in the hope of avoiding the kind of injury setbacks that have been all too frequent since he underwent hip resurfacing surgery three years ago.
The Scot’s decision to rekindle the alliance of former world No 1s for a third time marks a significant statement of intent. From his first grand slam title at Flushing Meadows a decade ago to his second Wimbledon crown in 2016, the year he claimed a second Olympic gold medal and broke the big three’s 12-year stranglehold at the top of the rankings, Murray’s defining moments have all come with Lendl in his corner. The Czech sets exacting standards, and he will not have agreed to a third reunion merely to make up the numbers on a team that is also expected to welcome a new assistant coach in due course.
Lendl’s return to the fold comes at a welcome moment for Murray who, despite achieving wins over the likes of Jannik Sinner, Hubert Hurkacz and Alexander Zverev, has struggled to find consistency with his metal hip. Delgado’s departure has merely exacerbated the situation and, after unsuccessful trials with the Spanish coach Esteban Carril and the experienced German Jan de Witt, Murray acknowledged at last month’s Dubai Open that a period of continuity would help.
“The consistency certainly has not been there, I’m totally aware of that,” said Murray, who has not won two successive matches since reaching the final of the Sydney Classic in January. “I want to try and get my coaching situation sorted… There’s a reason why, mostly, guys on the tour travel with coaches. Having some consistency and continuity there I think will help me get a bit of consistency back.”
The reappointment of Lendl, who coached Murray between 2011 and 2014 before returning for an 18-month spell two years later, should certainly help with the mental side of things. Lendl, an eight-time major winner who spent 270 weeks at No 1, was renowned for his mental toughness, a quality that Murray feels he has lacked in recent months.
Yet the third chapter of their partnership will play out in markedly different circumstances to those that preceded it. Understandably, given his injury travails, Murray’s ability to recover from long matches is no longer what it once was, yet he has shown little inclination to adapt his playing style accordingly. While Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer have both favoured a more aggressive approach to the game in their twilight years on the tour, Murray, perhaps fearful of making unforced errors that would draw him into longer battles, continues to fall back on the attritional approach that has served him so well in the past.
It will be intriguing to see if Lendl encourages him to change tack, particularly on the slick lawns of Wimbledon, where fortune tends to favour the bold.