Murray willing to wait on the Lendl effect

Jan 14, 2012, 6:09 GMT

Melbourne - Andy Murray is planning patience as he begins with new coach Lvan Lendl, with the Scot content to wait half a year or more before seeing results of the new collaboration.

'I'm not going to get the benefits from having Ivan this week,' said the Scot, seeded fourth at the Australian Open starting on Monday. 'I'm going to see it in six months, 12 months time, when all the things we work on start falling into place.'

Lendl and Murray did their coaching deal before Christmas, when Murray was in Miami for his off-season training block. The Florida-based Lendl will become a super-consultant and is not expected to travel with the two-time Melbourne finalist for all of the long tennis season.

'It's obviously good to have someone with his experience around the Slams and these situations. But in terms of actual improvements in my game, it's going to take a little bit longer than a week to make changes,' said Murray, who won the Brisbane title a week ago just hours after Lendl flew into the country.

Murray and Lendl obviously knew of each other before. But it was adidas team coach and television commentator Darren Cahill who helped to broker the coaching arrangement.

'I'd spoken to Ivan once or twice about four or five years ago when I was working with Brad Gilbert, when I trained at Bollettieri's,' said Murray. 'I chatted to him a couple of times, but nothing after that at all. I didn't really know him, no.'

But a chat with Cahill during the recent close season produced results. 'He had a few names, spoke to a few people. And Ivan was one of them.

'After speaking with him, meeting him a couple times, I spent a day on the court with him,' he said of Lendl, 51 and an eight-time grand Slam winner. 'It was pretty obvious that was the guy I wanted to work with, and that was it.

'I really enjoy being around him. He's been good fun, good sense of humour. As you probably expect, he has a lot of great stories to tell. He doesn't hang around all the time. When we get the work done, he leaves, does his own thing.'

Murray added: 'He's a very hard worker, I like hard work as well. He's obviously had a great attitude towards trying to improve. He tried many new things and he was always in great shape. He's definitely going to help with that side of things, as well.'

Read more about Murray