How Tricky Will It Be For Murray To Win A Second Slam?

Murray won his fist slam aged 25 years and 118 days.

The chart in the link lists the age of first slam win in the "open era". The only players listed here who won their first slam at age 25 or over (in the open era) and went on to win more are Rosewall at 33 (1st of 4), Laver 29 (1st of 3), Ashe 25 (1st of 3), Newcombe 26 (1st of 5) and Nastase 26 (1st of 2). Of course Rosewall, Laver and Newcombe won slams when they were younger as amateurs. So presumably only Ashe and Nastase won a slam for the first time at the age of 25 or older and went on to win more. Ashe was 25 years and 57 days when he won his first slam and Nastase was 26 years and 53 days. If Murray manages to win a second slam he will join a small select group. Why has it proved so difficult to win a second slam if the first is won relatively late? For those that think Murray can do this what makes him or his situation so special?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Grand_Slam_men%27s_singles_champions_by_age_at_first_win

Why has it proved so difficult to win a second slam if the first is won relatively late? For those that think Murray can do this what makes him or his situation so special?

Jeez there has only been one Slam since he won the first!

It won't be as tricky now that the competition is on the decline. He has fantastic opportunity to rack up some more Slams. Simply because he is that good at this moment in time.

Is it too early in the thread to mention the impending weak era?

bogbrush. mention whatever you think might be relevant...

It's impossible to predict the future but by looking at the past it's possible to get an idea about whats more or less likely to happen. Not many slams are won by players under the age of 20 or over 30 and there is only one player older than Murray when winning a first slam who has gone on to win more (Nastase). This suggests that there is something tricky about this particular task.

Shouldn't be too difficult. Really Murray should win Wimbledon this year. The window of opportunity is there.

hawkeye wrote:bogbrush. mention whatever you think might be relevant...

It's impossible to predict the future but by looking at the past it's possible to get an idea about whats more or less likely to happen. Not many slams are won by players under the age of 20 or over 30 and there is only one player older than Murray when winning a first slam who has gone on to win more (Nastase). This suggests that there is something tricky about this particular task.

I tend to agree with this. Despite the current trend towards older players being more successful, leaving it so late to win your first slam definitely cuts down you oppotunities to win more and also shows that you're not quite at the level of other players who were more successful at a younger age.
As HE says, it's impossible to predict, but I think Andy will do very well to win 1 or 2 more.

This one's easy.

Two years ago, three players would be the favourites in a match up against Andy.

One of them is now in his 32nd year.

One of them has just missed 7 months with injury and nobody knows what level he will return to.

Andy is also a much better player now.

So arguably only one player would be the favourite.

The answer to your question is "tricky". But his chance are better than a couple of years ago.

HM Murdoch. Winning a slam involves more than one or two matches against the best players. Do you think winning seven in a row is more tricky as a player gets older. I'm just wondering why players don't tend to go on and win more than one slam if they win their first late. Is there anything that might explain why Ashe and Nastase managed to do so. Is there anything in their circumstances or play similar to Murray?

hawkeye wrote:Do you think winning seven in a row is more tricky as a player gets older.

Yes, but not when older means "26 rather than 25"!

Also, although you can never rule out the upset, the Andy of today is the overwhelming favourite for the first 4 rounds, given the way the seedings work. The obstacles for Andy really only come from the QF onwards.

The challenge is not so much the number of matches but who those matches are against.

I don't expect Andy to achieve a huge slam haul - I think 5 would be a massive achievement - but I don't expect him to get stuck on 1 either.

By older I was referring to age at winning first slam and chances of winning more. In this case 25 is older as only two players of this age have ever done it. It is more common for players who have won their first slams at an earlier age to continue to win over this age.

My answer to the original question is I don't know. Djokovic is around his peak so will normally make it very difficult. Federer although ageing hasn't gone away yet and is always capable of turning on a master class. Nadal at the moment is a bit of an unknown due to his injury issues.

Of the others though. Yes Murray is 25/26 and only won 1 slam but of players younger than Murray only Del Potro (around a year younger) has won a slam and going by these boards there is currently no obvious 'next big thing'. So I feel unless he gets injured the chances will be there for a few years yet. Whether he takes them or not we will have to wait and see.

It will be very tricky of course. Murray had already proved that he can consistently reach the latter stages of slams, he's only failed to reach the last 4 once in the last 9 slams.

To win another he needs to beat 1 or more of the other top players. Up until the last year he'd never beaten Djokovic or Federer in a slam. Now he has.

I would say what makes Murray more likely to add to his tally than others that won their first 'late' in their career is the other things he has achieved. He is 6th or 7th on the all time masters winners list, is on an extremely exclusive list in having a positive h2h against the GOAT, and is one of a list of 5 or 6 players ever to reach all the semis of a slam in one year.

So whilst he is the same as the people mentioned in that link, he is also very different. I am certain he'll add to his slam count.

Danny_1982 wrote:It will be very tricky of course. Murray had already proved that he can consistently reach the latter stages of slams, he's only failed to reach the last 4 once in the last 9 slams.

To win another he needs to beat 1 or more of the other top players. Up until the last year he'd never beaten Djokovic or Federer in a slam. Now he has.

I would say what makes Murray more likely to add to his tally than others that won their first 'late' in their career is the other things he has achieved. He is 6th or 7th on the all time masters winners list, is on an extremely exclusive list in having a positive h2h against the GOAT, and is one of a list of 5 or 6 players ever to reach all the semis of a slam in one year.

So whilst he is the same as the people mentioned in that link, he is also very different. I am certain he'll add to his slam count.

Spot on Danny.

Calder106 wrote:Yes Murray is 25/26 and only won 1 slam but of players younger than Murray only Del Potro (around a year younger) has won a slam and going by these boards there is currently no obvious 'next big thing'.

Danny's point is good about what makes Murray different from those previous over 25 winners, but I think this is a more important point. HE, for all the others, were there younger slam winners around who were more of a threat?

Obviously it's still extremely tricky - Djokovic is a level above Murray in general IMO so Murray needs either to play a supreme match or for Djoko's level to be off slightly (or needs Ferrer to beat him in the semis ). Plus Fed is still around and consistently reaching semis at slams, Nadal is a bit of an unknown, Berdych can really trouble him plus plenty others who potentially could. I think 1 or 2 more slams would be a great achievement. I certainly don't feel as confident about Wimbledon as some others seem to.

Really good point Yvonne. Those past 'late' winners were probably very quickly replaced at the top of the game by the next generation. That doesn't look like happening any time soon.

Whether that is because the younger lot aren't very good or because 25-28 is the new 22-25 is a subjective thing. But the top guys look under no immediate threat from the younger lot playing today.

That makes this generation different to any other I can remember.

Danny_1982 wrote:Really good point Yvonne. Those past 'late' winners were probably very quickly replaced at the top of the game by the next generation. That doesn't look like happening any time soon.

Whether that is because the younger lot aren't very good or because 25-28 is the new 22-25 is a subjective thing. But the top guys look under no immediate threat from the younger lot playing today.

That makes this generation different to any other I can remember.

The difference with murray is that as you pointed out he doesn't look under threat from any of the younger players beneath him and also that he is very close to Djokovic and on his day can beat him. Novak is better, and I think by a significant margin, but not enough that when murray plays well or if Novak is off that Murray can't beat him. I really do forsee these two battling for the number 1 ranking and take their games to even higher level over the next couple of years barring injuries. That being said I think people are unwise to sleep on Nadal. He is starting look fearsome again in latin america and he is saying that the leg feels better. So I think Nadal can make it a three way battle for the top spot. Of the 3 I think Djokovic is obviously in the lead right now and the favorite to stay there for the near term.

Yes, Laver shouldn't be in there. He won amateur slams, then went professional shouldn't participate but would have won slams otherwise in his early and mid 20s. Then the year after the open era started he was winning the calendar year grand slam.

We can discount Rosewall for similar reasons, and Ashe, both of those winning in the first year of the open era.

Probably Newcombe as well. He also won just after the start of the open era.

So their first slam won being at a later than average age is not relevant.

Even Nastase is slightly grey area, since the open era started for him at the age of 22.

Then again, Lendl was only a year younger than Murray, and went on to win 8 in total. And Bill Tilden, going back much further, was a similar story if I recall.

The answer to this thread then was clearly "not very". Times have changed significantly in terms of age profiles in tennis. A better question is whether Stan can win a second slam - I am guessing he would be by far the oldest first time winner to do so.

LOL - glad you found this

  

Stan will not win another slam. Look on last nights' nadal thread if you don't believe in the quality of my predictions