Murray, the Fed Cup Captain is Calm During Rubbers

Written by: Staff on 2nd February 2012

Murray, the Fed Cup Captain is Calm During Rubbers |

Maternal devotion dictates that when Judy Murray watches matches of her son Andy as he battles it out to become Britain’s first male Grand Slam champion since Fred Perry, emotions regularly take over and she becomes one of the noisiest shouting, screaming, gesticulating supporters. Calmness most certainly does not pervade.

However Mrs. Murray’s debut as Britain’s Fed Cup captain showed her in a completely different light. As the British team adeptly won through the initial tie of their Euro/Africa Group I play-offs in Eilat with a 3-0 win over Portugal, their captain was a picture of silent, confident tranquility.

Murray offered only the occasional word of support and followed up with a hug of congratulations to Anne Keothavong, Elena Baltacha and the teenage doubles duo of Laura Robson and Heather Watson as they all scored straight sets victory to establish a 3-0 score line against the Portuguese.

“Oh, I didn’t have to do anything. I just kept them company,” said Murray, who has succeeded Nigel Sears as the British captain. “There’s no point in talking for the sake of it.”

But the players, who today realized they had a tougher task against the Netherlands who will be intent to make amends after their opening day 2-1 defeat by hosts Israel, were delighted with the support of their new captain.

Britain’s most experienced player, world no.57 Elena Baltacha said: “Judy has been a big part of making sure that there is lots of fun along with some very serious preparation for what is going to be a very tough assignment this week.

“Her approach is incredibly meticulous and she’s done so much homework on our opponents and how each of their players play that we will feel really well prepared going in.

“She and Leon Smith (Head of Men’s and Women’s tennis with the British Lawn Tennis Association) have brought piles of DVDs of matches for us to discuss and analyze so we spent a lot of time off-court going through those.”

Baltacha, celebrating a 6-2,6-3 against the notoriously noisy Michelle Larcher de Brito, added: “Of course it hasn’t all been business. Judy is a massive darts fan and she’s been trying to get us all hooked. I’m not sure it’s my game but she also has loads of word games that we’ve been playing in the evenings so there have been lots of laughs.

“I remember being on trips with Judy when I was a junior player and she always knew how to get everyone in the right mood. It’s lovely to be working with her again.”

Topics: Fed Cup, Judy Murray

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