Andy Murray will not be withdrawing from Wimbledon before Friday’s draw as he wants to leave it as late as possible.
The three-time Grand Slam champion is recovering from procedure after suffering a cyst in his back during his second round match at Queen’s Club with Jordan Thompson.
It was reported earlier in the week that he was going to withdraw from Wimbledon.
However that was quickly denied by the Murray camp as he is focusing on his rehab programme.
Now as he made his return to the practice court yesterday, Murray has detailed his road to recovery and has insisted he will make a decision as late as possible, “The rate that I’m improving just now, if that was to continue then an extra 72 to 96 hours makes a huge difference,” Murray was quoted by The Guardian as saying.
“It’s complicated, and it’s made more complicated because I want to play at Wimbledon one more time. I want to have that opportunity to play the tournament and I know that some people might look at that and say, withdrawing from a tournament late at the last minute or something like that isn’t the right thing to do, even though it happens every single week on the tour.
“The winner of Queen’s will pull out of Eastbourne when the draw has been done and is clearly totally fit. But I feel like I deserve the opportunity to try to play there again. And I want to have that opportunity, so I’m going to give it as long as I can to see how well I recover.”
Murray was due to have a smooth transition to potential retirement with Wimbledon and the Olympics being his perfect farewell to the sport.
In addition, Murray was also due to play doubles with brother Jamie at Wimbledon this year.
Despite criticism Murray has felt like he has earned the right to withdraw as late as possible and admits should he play Wimbledon and the Olympics, that will be his final farewell to the sport, “It has been mentioned to me, ‘Are you going to withdraw before the draw at 10am on Friday?’ And I’m like, Well, no, I’m not. I’m going to wait until the last minute to see if I’m going to be able to and I’ve earned that right to do that,” Murray stated.
“This is not clear cut where I am 100% going to be ready to play or there is a 0% chance that I can play. That is the situation. I would say it’s probably more likely that I’m not able to play singles right now. I’m also f****** doing rehab 24/7 to try to give myself that opportunity to play there again.
“I know that there’s more important things in the world than how I finish playing my last tennis match or where I finished playing my last tennis match. But because of what I put into the sport over the last however many years, I would at least like to go out playing a proper match where I’m at least competitive, not what happened at Queen’s.
“So I can’t say for sure that if I wasn’t able to play at Wimbledon, and I didn’t recover in time to play at the Olympics that I wouldn’t consider trying to play another tournament somewhere. But if I’m able to play at Wimbledon and if I’m able to play at the Olympics, that’s most likely going to be it.”
Wimbledon starts on the 1st of July and the Olympics begins on the 27th of July.