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[Aileen]

I think it's great for both Andy and the team when he does play Davis Cup so i think he should, fitness allowing. Next year would provide matches that would appeal to his competitive spirit a bit more too against better quality players.
Re The Olympics..does anyone know how many players are allowed from each country in the singles? Not sure how the Olympic format works!

Up to four players are allowed per country, and if you want to find out more about the Olympic format, then this link should help -

http://www.nbcolympics.com/tennis/index.html

However, I agree with Alis and Tasmanian Devil that (a) Andy is going to be under pressure to play, although perhaps he might be forgiven for missing one tie, although (b) the onus really has to be on other players to raise their game.  I'm not too worried about the doubles combination of Fleming/Hutchins because they work well together and reached the QF of the USO, beating the No.2 seeds Max Mirnyi and Daniel Nestor en route, where they lost against the No.5 seeds in a rain-disrupted match; but our other singles players really will have to buck themselves up, although our No.2 James Ward has shown a lot of promise as an improving player.  What happened to him at Braehead was unfortunate.   

[Alis]

I think the players are quite right to make a stand now when they have the chance.  I had a wry smile this morning when the pundits were complaining at the rugby world cup about teams having to play two 80 minute matches in 4 days.  I know it's a different type of physicality but tennis players have to be some of the fittest sportsmen around.

[Aileen]

I think the players are quite right to make a stand now when they have the chance.  I had a wry smile this morning when the pundits were complaining at the rugby world cup about teams having to play two 80 minute matches in 4 days.  I know it's a different type of physicality but tennis players have to be some of the fittest sportsmen around.

And I get similar amusement watching football players hopping and skipping around the pitch when doing their "training".  They should watch some of Andy's training videos and see what real physical training is all about.  They'd probably suffer from exhaustion just watching them!

Latest on this threatened action by the players -

Michael Stich hits out at talk of tennis players' strike

Top players threatening to strike in protest at a crowded schedule should stop living in a dream world, according to former Wimbledon champion Michael Stich .....

Full story - http://in.reuters.com/article/2011/09/20/idINIndia-59450520110920

[Aileen]

Well it's the players that make the sport. If the top players who bring the attention and money to the sport are willing to make a stand over how much they have to play in a year then they should be listened too. I'm not saying that there should suddenly be tons of gaps but there's pretty much not break from January till the end of Wimbledon, after the US things are a bit quiter but still a lot of tournaments. Even if there was some way of at couple of down weeks being found in the first 6 months of the tour then it would probably help.

I  think Stich should keep his nose out of this and accept that today's players are dealing with entirely different issues.  Certainly from next year the players will have a 7 week off-season following the WTF instead of the present 5 (4 if they have to play in the DC finals at the beginning of December), but, as I can't see any tournaments being dropped, it seems that at least two more tournaments will be played back-to-back, and I understand that next year, whether or not it's due to the Olympics, the Paris Masters and WTF are going to played that way, which is particularly unfair at a time of year when the top players will be tired.  It's hard enough for them as it is.

What Andy has said, and I'm sure the others might agree with him, is that fewer Masters should be mandatory, rather than just the current one.  That would give the players the option of taking a break when they wanted to rather than the schedule having to be revised.

The only thing where Stich makes a point is about the playing of Exhibition matches, but again if players want to play them, well, it's their choice.

[Aileen]

Stich is always pretty negative about Andy so I'm not too surprised by his comments.   I'm not best pleased with the news reports about a possible strike.  It reads as though Andy has just dreamed this up himself. He was asked if a strike was possible and he responded.  You would also think that Andy was the only person complaining about the calendar etc.  Have journalists forgotten just what went on at the US Open.  Andy was just one of several players with concerns.  You'd think Andy was organising this player meeting himself.

I suppose our media are focussing on him because he's British but I agree that it's very unfair that it's coming across as a one-man show, so look out for the next label he's going to be tagged with - no doubt something along the lines of Andy Murray the Troublemaker.

[Caz]

Don't that lot just make you want to throw up? Arrrrrgh!

[Alis]

Interesting, no publicity on Radio 4 or evening news about Davis Cup win. Suddenly lots of news about "Red" Andy wanting strikes. Grrr

I agree BBH, this is so incredibly annoying - I wouldn't mind betting that Rafa doesn't have to put up with the same sort of treatment from the Spanish press.  

David Lloyd's piece speaks volumes about him - green-eyed and monster are the words that spring to mind.  On the main tour circuit, when the game was much less physical than it is now, he reached a career high of 128, won 24 matches and lost 55 - I don't think he has any idea what it was like for the top players then let alone now!