Andy Murray is itching for his shot at redemption, if not quite revenge, against career-long friend and foe Novak Djokovic in Friday night’s Australian Open semi-final at Melbourne Park.
If Britain’s perennial grand slam hope retains any psychological scarring from his shattering loss to Djokovic in last year’s title match, he’s doing a great job of hiding it.
Murray left Australia a tortured soul, desperate for some solitude and time out from tennis after being duck-egged in straight sets for the third time in as many grand slam finals.
But while everyone knows how Djokovic kicked on so spectacularly after landing his second slam in Melbourne, Murray bounced back to enjoy quite a special year too.
The Scot remains a major maiden but his efforts in reaching the last four in Paris, London and New York have left him believing he’s as close as ever to breaking into the most exclusive club in men’s tennis.
“I probably definitely have more experience than I had at this point last year because I played deep in the slams the last five or six of them,” Murray said.
“I’m not necessarily more relaxed – just more used to being in this position because of the experience.”
Murray and Djokovic, born one week apart, have been playing each other for literally half a lifetime, so the Scottish fourth seed has no hang-ups about facing the red-hot world No.1 in another high-stakes encounter at Rod Laver Arena.
“Well, I’ve always liked playing against him. And after the year that he had, the loss (in 2011 final) didn’t look so bad six months later,” Murray said.
“I’d like to get the chance to play him again. It would be a good marker to see how I’ve improved since last year.”
This will be Murray’s fifth successive grand slam semi-final and ninth overall.
Djokovic snared his first major in Melbourne after a similar run of four consecutive grand slam semi-finals in 2007-08 and his second three years later after making the last four on nine occasions in total.
The Serb knows from experience that if you keep knocking on the door like Murray has been, entry to the grand slam winners’ club is almost inevitable.
“He’s definitely, I think, very motivated to win his first grand slam,” Djokovic said.
“He’s played in the last two year’s finals here. He’s been proving to himself and to the rest of the people that the Australian Open is probably his best grand slam.
“But on the other hand, I have been playing quite well here in last couple years.”
If Djokovic was to relinquish his crown, he’d be happy for Murray to seize it.
“We’ve been friends for a long time – always had lots of respect for him,” the top seed said after declaring himself 100 per cent fit despite hurting his hamstring in Wednesday’s quarter-final defeat of David Ferrer.
“We practise whenever we can. Our friendship and rivalry, you can call it, goes long time back, goes to when we were 12 in France.
“We played a lot of junior events together. It’s great to see that somebody who you grow up next to is doing well.
“This is going to be another great challenge for both of us.”
