By 2010, Murray and Novak Djokovic had separated themselves from the rest of men's tennis, joining Federer and Nadal in the Big Four
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He first emerged onto the scene in 1999 when he won Florida’s Orange Bowl in his age group, one of the most prestigious junior tournaments in the world. He won it again two years later. Sir Andrew Barron Murray OBE is a British professional tennis player from Scotland. He had been ranked world No. 1 by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) for 41 weeks, and finished as the year-end No. 1 in 2016. Originally coached by his mother Judy alongside his older brother Jamie, Murray moved to Barcelona at age 15 to train at the Sánchez-Casal Academy. He began his professional career around the time Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal established themselves as the two dominant players in men’s tennis. Murray had immediate success on the ATP Tour, making his top 10 debut in 2007 at age 19.
By 2010, Murray and Novak Djokovic had separated themselves from the rest of men’s tennis, joining Federer and Nadal in the Big Four, the group of players who dominated men’s tennis during the 2010s. Murray initially struggled against the rest of the Big Four, losing his first four Grand Slam finals – three to Federer and one to Djokovic. He made his major breakthrough in 2012 by defeating Djokovic to win the US Open. With this title, he became the first British Grand Slam singles champion since Virginia Wade in 1977, and the first male champion since Fred Perry in 1936. A month earlier, he won the men’s singles gold medal against Federer at the 2012 London Olympics.
From 2013 through 2016, Murray reached another six major finals. He won two of these encounters, at Wimbledon in 2013 and 2016. Murray had his career-best season in 2016. During that year, Murray made three major finals, winning Wimbledon. He also defended his title at the 2016 Rio Olympics to become the only man with two Olympic gold medals in singles. Murray also became world No. 1 for the first time and clinched the year-end No. 1 ranking by winning his only ATP Finals against Djokovic. Since 2016, he has struggled with various injuries and fell out of the top 100 in 2018 due to only playing only one tour.
Ivan Lendl is remembered for two major things: pioneering a revolutionary style of play and for being the first male player to appear in 19 Grand Slam finals. The former tennis star from Czechoslovakia (now the Czech Republic) won a total of 8 Grand Slams in his career, although notably none of those came at Wimbledon. However, that takes nothing away from what a dangerous player he was at the time. Indeed, he was ranked world number 1 for a grand total of 270 weeks in the course of his career.
Lendl turned pro in 1978 and although it took him a few years to find success, it came in droves when it final arrived. His first Grand Slam win came at Roland Garros in 1984 and his final Grand Slam win came in the Australian Open of 1990. He would retire from the sport in 1994 and went on to become quite a successful coach.
Besides being an eight-time Grand Slam champion, Lendl was also quite a threat in ATP events. He ended his career having won a grand total of 94 titles, which is some number when you take into account how much talent was on the circuit at that point.
He might not have won any Grand Slams till 1984, but he proved his mettle in other events even before that. He won seven straight tournament finals in 1980, with three of those wins coming in three straight weeks. In 1982, he won 15 of the 23 tournaments he entered and even had at one point a 44-match winning streak.
