Andy Murray eyes 800-match wins before retiring – How many more years will he have to play to reach his goal?

Shahida Jacobs 28 Feb 2023 1:34 PM

Andy Murray has been there, done that and got quite a few t-shirts when it comes to achieving his goals in tennis, but he admits he has a few ambitions left before he retires.

He has won three Grand Slams, is a two-time Olympic gold medallist, has 46 career singles titles to his name and is former world No 1 – to name just a few of his achievements.

However, at the age of 35, Murray will be the first to admit that he no longer has age on his side and probably won’t add to his 41 weeks as world No 1 while a fourth Grand Slam title is a long way away.

But that doesn’t mean he no longer has ambitions.

After his Qatar Open final defeat against Danill Medvedev, Murray opened up about those dreams – and yes, those ambitions have changed in recent years.

“I have goals. I think it’s important to have goals and targets and, you know, some of those goals are different to maybe what they were five, ten years ago,” he said.

“But I still have ambitions of winning tournaments and having deep runs in major events, you know, winning a certain number of matches in my career. I’d like to try to get to 800 match wins, which, I don’t know, I think I’m like 75 away from that.

“There are little things that you can do to keep yourself to keep yourself motivated. I also, like, part of it is seeing how far I can go with, well, the physical limitation that I have. You know, like I didn’t know how much I was going to be able to play or if I’d be able to compete at this level again.

“So now that I know that I’m able to, I want to see how far that can go, because, yeah, it’s a challenge and something that, you know, I’m proud of the results that I’m having, yeah, with a large physical limitation.”

So how close is he to achieving that 800-match milestone and what about those above him?

Murray currently sits on 723 career wins and, in case you were wondering, he has played 959 matches for a win-loss record of 75.4%.

In terms of ATP Tour records, which started in 1990, only three players have reached 800 match wins and you are correct if you guessed Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic.

Top 10 players with the most ATP Tour match wins

1. Roger Federer Switzerland 1,251
2. Rafael Nadal Spain 1,068
3. Novak Djokovic Serbia 1,043
4. Andre Agassi United States 735
5. Pete Sampras United States 734
5. David Ferrer Spain 734
7. Andy Murray United Kingdom 723
8. Tomas Berdych Czech Republic 640
9. Lleyton Hewitt Australia 616
10. Andy Roddick United States 612

Should Murray get to the magical 800-mark before he retires, he will end up fourth on the table as he, Nadal and Djokovic are the only active players on the list.

If you take the Open Era record, then he is currently quite a long way away from the top 10. Jimmy Connors (1,274) leads the way and he is followed by Federer (1,251), Ivan Lendl (1,068), Nadal (1,068), Djokovic (1,043), Guillermo Vilas (951), Ilie Nastase (908), John McEnroe (883), Andre Agassi (870), Stefan Edberg (801), Arthur Ashe (799), Stan Smith (779), Pete Sampras (762), Ferrer (734) and Manuel Orantes (724).

What are the chances of Murray reaching the Big 800 before he retires?

In case you don’t want to do the calculations yourself, Murray is 77 wins away from 800 career wins.

The 2022 campaign was his first real full season on the ATP Tour in several years as the previous two years were disrupted by the Covid-19 pandemic while he was still nursing his way back in 2018 and 2019 following career-saving hip surgery.

We can’t really compare his current results and matches to pre-surgery as that would be unfair. Remember, he won an incredible 78 matches in 2016 and 71 in 2015.

Last year he won 26 matches and if he continues to average that for the remainder of his career then he will take another three seasons to get to that 800 target (77 ÷ 26 = 2,9 years).

So that would mean he would have to play until the age of 39, possibly 40 since his birthday is in May, if he is to reach that. Of course, he could enjoy a couple of seasons where he picks up more than 30 wins and that would see him play for maybe two more years after 2023.

But for those who love Andy Murray, it will be music to their ears that he is hoping to play for a few more years.