Andy Murray has appointed Ivan Lendl as his coach for a third spell since they first worked together in 2012 and under whose guidance he won all three of his grand slam titles.
Murray has been searching for a coach since splitting from Jamie Delgado – now working with Denis Shapovalov – in December. A brief spell with the German Jan De Witt ended after the Australian Open and Murray turned to old friend Dani Vallverdú for his recent tournaments in Rotterdam, Doha and Dubai. But Vallverdú has a full-time role with Stan Wawrinka and Murray’s search has taken him to another very familiar face.
Murray won his first grand slam title under Lendl at the US Open in 2012 before ending Britain’s 77-year wait for a Wimbledon men’s singles champion the following year. The Scot was hurt by their split in 2014 but they reunited two years later shortly before Murray clinched his second Wimbledon title. He ended the season as world No 1 after a string of titles but Murray’s hip problems began the following summer and in November 2017 Lendl again left the team. It is not yet known how much Lendl will travel with Murray but the 34-year-old will stay in the US after this month’s tournaments in Indian Wells and Miami for an extended training block. Murray has already said he will skip the clay season so the focus can be solely on preparing for the grass-court tournaments.
The good news for the Scot is that his body has held up well since last summer and he has been able to train and play consistently, but that has not been matched by the results he was hoping for.
He has at least returned to the top 100 at last – his ranking is currently 84 – but, aside from his run to the final of the ATP Tour event in Sydney in January, wins have come in ones and twos. Murray will hope that Lendl can once again get the best out of him and help him back towards the top of the game while being careful not to overdo things physically, which was the major concern about their previous spells together.
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After splitting from Murray, Lendl had a spell coaching Alexander Zverev from August 2018 to July 2019 but that ended somewhat acrimoniously and the eight-time grand slam champion has kept a low profile since.
Murray, meanwhile, is also searching for an additional coach to travel with him and work closely with Lendl, as Vallverdú and Delgado have done in the past.