Andy Murray emotional at playing with Serena Williams in Wimbledon mixed doubles
As a serial winner of grand slams, Davis Cups and Olympic gold medals, Andy Murray has done almost everything there is to do in the sport of tennis. But the prospect of playing alongside Serena Williams in Friday’s mixed-doubles event is still enough to make him feel emotional.
Murray has a reputation within both locker rooms for being a champion of equality. Indeed, it was in this capacity that he made headlines around the world in 2017. When a (male) journalist asked him about American players’ recent underperformance at Wimbledon, Murray subtly pointed out the gender bias in the question, which overlooked Williams’ seven singles titles since 2002.
Two years on, he is preparing to actually take to the court alongside Williams, in what will be only the 12th mixed-doubles match of his career. He has previously played at the Olympics with two Britons – Laura Robson and Heather Watson – as well as at Wimbledon with Belgium’s Kirsten Flipkens in 2010.
After practising on Wednesday with his male doubles partner, Pierre-Hugues Herbert, Murray was asked how significant a moment this will be in the context of his career. “I was talking to my wife about it,” he replied. “With everything that has gone on the last couple of years, you don’t know what’s coming next or what’s round the corner.
“The opportunity to play with Serena, she’s one of the best tennis players of all time and one of the biggest female athletes ever. It’s something that I may never get another chance to do, and potentially I might not play mixed doubles again so if I’m going to do it once the chance to play with her is obviously brilliant and not something I expected to happen.”
It feels as if these two Wimbledon champions – who took the stage together at the 2016 Champions’ Dinner, but never danced – have been in the throes of a slow-motion courtship since Saturday. That afternoon, Williams was first asked whether she would consider teaming up with Murray, and replied with a coy, “I’m available”.
On Wednesday, Murray clarified that backstage discussions had been in progress since late last week. As he explained, “Delgy [his coach Jamie Delgado] had a message from Patrick [Mouratoglou, Williams’ coach] asking if I was fixed up for doubles. He said no. And then, would it be of interest to play with Serena?
“We kind of chatted about it for a couple of days. I know she had had a bit of problems with her knee this year and both sides kind of wanted to see how her match went before we did the final part. She felt fine yesterday (Tuesday) and I saw her briefly today (Wednesday) – she seems like she is up for it!”
These doubles newlyweds have not yet had the chance to practice together. Thursday looks unlikely as well, with Williams due to play her second-round singles match against Kaja Juvan on Centre Court. But on Friday they will try to get a hit in before their opening match, which will be against one of the lower-ranked pairings in the draw.
There was real potential here for an awkward sibling clash, given that both Jamie Murray and Venus Williams have also entered the mixed event (not playing with each other, unfortunately). But instead the opposition pairing will be Germany’s Andreas Mies – who recently shared the French Open men’s title with compatriot Kevin Krawietz – and American-turned-Chilean Alexa Guarachi.
It takes a little time for a new team to bed down, as Murray’s male partner Herbert admitted after practice. “On Friday we started off against a really tough team [Jean-Julien Roger and Horia Tecau] playing points, and we had never played points together. For sure it wasn’t the best practice session but it was still okay.
“Today we were supposed to just hit together and do some drills but in the end Tim Puetz and Freddie Nielson came to play some points. It was an hour and a half and my leg [which has been bothering Herbert since Eastbourne last week] is alright, although I am still a little bit tired. I think we’re happy about our session today! And we are looking forward to our match now.”
For Herbert, the excitement of teaming up with Murray on his home turf on Thursday afternoon is comparable to how Murray feels about the Williams pairing. “It’s special because it takes me into his world a little bit, it’s something I don’t really live the whole year. He grabs a lot of attention and he has grabbed me a little bit with him.”
From the Murrays' perspective, Wimbledon has arrived a few days later than usual. In 2017, for instance, Andy walked out to open the Centre Court schedule at the start of the week. Whereas the first two rounds of singles will be almost complete by the time he and Jamie take to the court on Thursday.
Still, expectations always run high where this family is concerned. As the former world No 1 Victoria Azarenka put it when asked about the "Murrena" pairing, "Good luck to everybody else."
