Andy Murray knows why free spirit Nick Kyrgios is an Australian Open threat

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2015/jan/26/andy-murray-nick-kyrgios-australian-open

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Nick Kyrgios has hit 60 more aces, 97, than Andy Murray going into their quarter-final at the Australian Open on Tuesday but he will find it hard to maintain that against the Scottish wall, whose defence tops the list of serves returned with 353 of 431 received.

This almost certainly will be the battle zone that determines whether or not Australia will still have a teenage hero to cheer in the semi-finals or a familiar friend in Murray, a three-times finalist who has been coming to Melbourne for 10 years and who has always received warm support – although maybe not now against one of their own.

That has happened only once here, last week when Murray made mincemeat of Marinko Matosevic in three sets – and even then the British No1’s quirky tennis and fighting instincts drew ritual respect from fans accustomed to watching him extricate himself from all manner of difficult circumstances. There will be moments on Tuesday when he will probably have to do so again.

“He serves well,” Murray said of Kyrgios. “Hopefully I can read his serve well. When I played him in Toronto [winning easily in the second round of the Masters 1000 there last August], I felt like after the first couple of games I started to get a decent read on his serve. If I can do that again, that will stand me in good stead.”

One other statistic falls nicely for Murray: his career record against Australians is 10-0, for the cost of only three sets. So there is plenty riding on this for local fans, although, as hard as the Australian media have tried to paint Murray as the pantomime villain, he is having none of it. “I’m not into breaking any hearts,” he told an Australian journalist. “I’m into beating whoever it is on the other side of the net.”

He knows 19-year-old Kyrgios, the sort of free spirit whose ambitions are not shackled by a history of disappointment, will be riding a wave of adrenaline after some heroic performances to get this far, none more dramatic than his five-set win on Saturday night over Andreas Seppi, who had put out Roger Federer in the previous round.

Murray is taking nothing for granted – but he did seize on a remark by Kyrgios before the tournament, “I definitely think I can make an impact”, which has been hyped up to suggest he had declared the title was as good as his.

“If you say that you’re going to win the event,” Murray said, “you have to expect [a reaction]. It happens to everyone so I don’t feel sorry for him. I’ve been through that for 10 years of my career at Wimbledon – it’s something you have to learn how to deal with.”

When Murray was 19, he experienced almost identical pressure at Wimbledon, beating Andy Roddick before losing to Marcos Baghdatis in the fourth round.

“When I played at Wimbledon when I was 19 I really enjoyed it. There’s no pressure at that age because you’re not expected to win. After you’ve beaten a top player, someone like Roddick, on a big court it’s great, but once you start to get a little bit older and people are expecting you to reach the quarters, the semis, the final, then that changes things. I would say it’s probably a bit easier to enjoy it when you’re that age but obviously once you get to the latter stages the pressure builds because you’re only a couple of matches away from winning.

“From the matches I’ve seen, he’s played very good tennis but he’s also been showing a lot of emotion. He’s broken a bunch of rackets and got a bunch of warnings as well. I don’t know if that’s through stress or nerves or pressure, or whatever it is, but he’s playing extremely well. I’ve no idea how he deals with the pressure.”

Murray, who has lost only once to a home player in 10 matches in a grand slam, Gaël Monfils in 2006 in Paris, said: “I like playing in front of a big crowd, I enjoy playing on the big courts and there is always a very good atmosphere when you play against them. I also have a very good record in the Davis Cup, home and away. I enjoy it – whether it is a home crowd that is right behind you or a crowd that is completely against you. When there is an atmosphere, it gives you a little bit of extra focus, of concentration.”

He might need every bit of that against Kyrgios, although it would be a genuine surprise if he did not find a way to win, probably in four sets.