Judy Murray: 'Stop talking about when Andy is going to retire'

As a 36-year-old Andy Murray gets ready to compete in singles at Wimbledon for a 15th time in his storied career, his mother Judy has made one plea: Enough with all the retirement talk and just let him play.

The two-time Wimbledon winner recently captured back-to-back Challenger titles on grass in the build-up to these Championships and has returned to the world’s top-40 for the first time since 2018.

A former world No1 and three-time Grand Slam champion, Murray’s career was rocked by a hip injury in 2017, which required multiple surgeries, including a hip resurfacing procedure that could have ended his spell as a professional tennis player.

The Scot has somehow found a way to continue competing with a metal hip and arrives at SW19 ranked 39 in the world and feeling confident on the grass.

He recently was asked by Sky Sports if this was going to be his final Wimbledon and Murray said he hoped it wasn’t, and feels he can remain competitive for another couple of years.

Speaking to The National at the WTA’s 50th anniversary celebration event in London on Friday, Judy Murray urged people to stop focusing on her son’s retirement date and instead appreciate him while he is still around.

“I think the fact that he’s still competing, still playing – I mean when he got the hip injury in 2017 he was No1 in the world, he was playing the best tennis of his life and just so unlucky because it took a long time for him to find the right way to address that injury and then to recover from it, rehab from it, took a long, long time,” said Judy.

Andy Murray during a practice session ahead of the 2023 Wimbledon Championships. Reuters

“And I think the fact that he’s still playing shows his passion for the game, his love of competition and