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After the Wimbledon champion winner Andy Murray almost forgot to pay his mother a visit in the stands last night, Judy Murray has suddenly been thrown in the limelight, once again. In Andy’s defence, his mom was beating a hasty retreat to give the cameras a miss, and she was pretty successful after even her son overlooked her.
The 53-year-old Scottish may appear cold and even hard when the cameras repeatedly pan on her, but she clearly had her heart in her mouth every time her second born missed a Championship point, which were a handful of occasions. For one, her display of emotion is quite unlike something the centre court would appreciate.
Often pitched as the antithesis to the Henmans, she has unabashedly described her desire to see Murray take the Slam. She yells, punches the air and Andy seems to draw energy from her presence.
She reportedly feels a “mixture of nausea and heart attack” watching her son compete. She also once said, “I know that when Andy looks up, he wants to see some kind of positive reaction. You will never find me doing anything negative like shaking my head. Never, ever.”
Here are 5 things you didn’t know about Mrs. Judith “Judy” Murray.
Current captain of the British Fed Cup team
Judy Murray
Captaining Great Britain’s team in the Federation Cup comes easily to Judy Murray. The Federation Cup is essentially the female equivalent of the Davis Cup. She is a mentor and coach to the homegrown talent.
She was appointed unanimously in December 2011, a position previously held by Nigel Sears, Kim Sears’ father. The press in Israel, where the Fed cup was recently concluded, has taken to calling her the ‘Queen Mother’, which may not be very far from what the rest of the world is getting to at the moment.
Mother of two Wimbledon champions
Judy Murray with her sons Andy (L) and Jamie
Judy Murray’s sons, Andy and Jamie, are now both Wimbledon champions. Andy Murray was just crowned the Champion, after 77 years of no British Champion at Wimbledon.
Jamie Murray won Wimbledon mixed doubles title in 2007 with Jelena Jankovi?. He specializes in doubles, and is currently Scotland’s number 2 and Britain’s number 7. Aged 27, elder to Andy by 15 months, Jamie was also runner-up in the 2008 US Open with American Liezel Huber, when they lost to Leander Paes and Cara Black.
A Tweleb
Judy Murray
Her twitter bio simply reads ‘Tennis coach, casually passing off the heritage that precedes her, and the glory that lies in wait.’ @judmoo has over 77,000 followers, and she has clearly cracked the code when it comes to the mercurial social medium.
With over 10,000 tweets, she is not just another average user, but is more of the seasoned type. She even twitpic’d herself with Gerard Butler after her son’s win, casually stating, “celebrating with Gerard Butler. Very pleasant.” Keeping up with the times was certainly never this fun.
A fighter
Judy Murray
Initially, Mrs. Murray thought Jamie would be the better of the siblings, and Andy would probably play second fiddle, after the latter exhibited poor co-ordination and a short fuse. She states that Andy bettered his elder brother not because of how the family helped him grow, but because of his need to pip Jamie.
The family also went through emotional and mental trauma after both the brothers were at Dunblane Primary School at the time of the infamous 1996 shootings. William Murray, their father and Judy Murray split when the kids were still in high school, and the brothers lived with the former.
Judy too lived close by, ensuring her presence was felt when the kids were in their formative years. Judy has also been targeted with a lot of hate mail, calling her awful and terrible. Even Boris Becker chose to reprimand Andy for getting his mum along for all the tennis, but it seems to have finally paid off.
Ambitious and enterprising
Judy Murray at the Set4Sport media launch
Born Judy Erskine, she is the daughter of Roy Erskine, an optician who played professional football for Stirling Albion and Eileen Shirley, a keen tennis player.
She was a qualified tennis coach at the age of 17. She went on to study French and Business at Edinburgh University. She also worked in retail management, similar to her husband William.
She recently started her campaign, Set4Sport, which promotes all the games and activities she devised to keep her hyperactive boys when they were growing up. Partnered by the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), Judy Murray certainly has a long way to go, on and off the field.
