Player Features

Jamie Murray makes history, plays 1,000th tour-level doubles match

Jamie Murray played the 1,000th tour-level doubles match of his career on Monday at the BNP Paribas Open, becoming the first Briton and only the second active player, joining Marcelo Melo, to accomplish the feat.

“It is something I'm proud of and I think it shows longevity, being able to play on the Tour for that long and still be going,” Murray told ATPTour.com. “I had zero awareness of it, to be honest, until Dubai actually, and someone asked me how many matches I've played. I thought I'd only played like 800, so that was kind of a pleasant surprise.”

Murray played his first tour-level match 19 years ago in Nottingham alongside brother Andy Murray, who was 19 at the time. They retired four games into the match when Jamie suffered an injury.

“I hurt my knee very strangely when I turned around after a point and then it totally locked,” Jamie recalled.

The lefty has not had to retire from a match since. He has carved a historic career over the past two decades, climbing to the top of the PIF ATP Doubles Rankings in 2016 and winning 34 tour-level men’s doubles titles, including triumphs at the Australian Open and US Open in 2016.

Most Doubles Matches Played (Active Players)

Player	Tour-Level Matches
1) Marcelo Melo	1,079*
2) Jamie Murray	1,000*
3) Jean-Julien Rojer	949
4) Rohan Bopanna	915
5) Marcel Granollers	863

^{*Still competing in Indian Wells}
Now 39, Murray has remained remarkably consistent, maintaining his place in the world’s Top 50 since September 2013. Currently World No. 25, he won three ATP Tour titles (two with John Peers, one with Michael Venus) last year. But the Scot is aware that his time on Tour will not last forever.

“You're definitely more conscious of it. Will that be my last Australian Open? Will this be my last Indian Wells? When you're 23, 24 you're not thinking about that, because you take it for granted in the sense that, 'I might be here for another 10 years, it's okay if I lose first round’,” Murray said. “You play [poorly] or whatever it's like, ‘Okay, next year’. But now you don't know, so it gives you the extra motivation to max out on your experiences at these tournaments because that might be it for me.”

Another element Murray has added to his career is his role as tournament director at the HSBC Championships, an ATP 500 event at Queen’s Club. Last year’s edition was Murray’s first at the helm.

“It's been interesting. I think getting involved in a tournament, it's a decent responsibility,” Murray said. “I want to do the best I can for the Queen's tournament. But I also enjoy learning about how this stuff is put together, and all the different kind of facets of that go into putting these events on. I find it interesting, because the thing for players is, pretty much, guys will turn up on let's say Friday, for sure Saturday before the tournaments, when everything's kind of done.

“They might be doing some final checks and touch-ups and stuff like that, but the majority of the work is all done. So they only see it when it's at its best, they don't really see when it's a building site, all the different things that go into putting this all together. So that interests me, for sure, and certainly over the past few years [I have] taken more of an interest in that.”

As Murray travels the world to compete, he also has an eye on various aspects of tournaments to pass feedback along to the Queen’s Club team. It has also helped him cast an eye towards his future.

“You realise that you are coming to the end of your career,” Murray said. “It's not like I've got another 10 years of of playing, and you start to definitely think about that more, and what you're going to do once you finish, what opportunities might be out there, and taking time now to find stuff that interests you, and what you might want to kind get involved in and give your time to.”

Murray explained that he has loved his time on the ATP Tour and created plenty of “amazing memories and experiences”. He is still enjoying the traveling and competing. The five-time Nitto ATP Finals competitor is playing in Indian Wells with Adam Pavlasek.

“It's exciting for me that I still feel that I've got the level to get out and still play these big tournaments and compete and potentially win them,” Murray said. “So I think as long as I'm able to do that and my ranking is getting me into the events, then I want to keep playing as long as I'm enjoying it and my body feels good.

“I think once it finishes, it's gone forever, right? So many ex-players tell me, 'Play as long as you can, play as long as you can'. Nothing compares when you move into that different phase of your life.”