Two brothers, a tiny homemade court inside the house, and one rule: you’re not allowed to hit the ball hard. That indoor game — the Murrays called it “touch tennis” — might be the most important training Andy Murray ever did.
Both Murray brothers became world No. 1: Jamie in doubles, Andy in singles. They started in the same garden, with the same mom-coach, 15 months apart. If you’ve got more than one kid and a hallway, pay attention.
Childhood
Andy Murray was born in Glasgow, Scotland, on May 15, 1987, and grew up in Dunblane, a small town between Glasgow and Edinburgh. His mother, Judy, was a top Scottish player turned coach who would go on to become Scotland’s national coach and later Great Britain’s Fed Cup captain. His father, William, worked in retail. Older brother Jamie was just 15 months ahead of him.
Judy took Andy to the local courts at age 3 — not for lessons, but to hang around while she coached, whacking balls with his brother. He played his first tournament at 5; by 8, he was competing against adults in the Central District Tennis League.
Here’s the part that matters: tennis was play first. Judy ran coordination games in the back garden. Inside the house, the brothers set up a miniature court and played “touch tennis,” where the whole skill was soft hands and control.
Tennis wasn’t even the only sport. Andy played football, golf, rugby, and gymnastics — and loved football enough to be invited to train with Glasgow Rangers at 15. His parents separated when he was 10, and the family held together through it.
What set them apart early
Judy has said Andy wasn’t initially the better player — Jamie, 15 months older, was ahead, and Judy fed Andy extra balls just to build his coordination. What Andy had was ferocious competitiveness and a mind for the game: even tiny, he anticipated, redirected, and figured opponents out.
The other thing coaches noticed: the return. Murray grew into one of the great returners in tennis history, and you can draw a straight line from touch tennis — soft hands, reading the ball early, redirecting pace — to the grown-up weapon.
And the sibling effect can’t be overstated. Having a brother 15 months older meant Andy always had a slightly better practice partner, every single day, for free. He spent his childhood chasing Jamie. Chasing is excellent training.
How he trained as a junior
- Ages 3–8: garden games and local club. Coordination games with mom, touch tennis indoors, junior tournaments around Britain with Judy (by the mid-90s she was Scotland’s national coach and took groups of top Scottish juniors on tournament trips).
- Multi-sport through his early teens. Football, rugby, golf, gymnastics — he didn’t specialize until tennis won the argument around 15–16. “By the time I was 16 I was really starting to think tennis was going to be my career,” he later said.
- Barcelona at 15. About 18 months at the Sánchez-Casal Academy in Spain, training on clay — slower courts that built rally tolerance, movement, and patience. His parents backed the move abroad; as Andy put it later, “They allowed us to go away abroad to train and pursue our dreams… that takes a lot of time and it’s an expensive sport.”
He won the US Open boys’ singles title in 2004 and turned pro in 2005 at 18.
The through-line to pro success
Murray’s junior toolkit became his pro identity: the all-time return game, the tactical brain, the refusal to give away cheap points. He won three Grand Slam titles (US Open 2012, Wimbledon 2013 and 2016), two Olympic singles gold medals (2012, 2016), led Great Britain to the Davis Cup in 2015, and reached world No. 1 in November 2016 — months after his brother hit No. 1 in doubles.
His 2013 Wimbledon title ended a 77-year wait for a British men’s champion. The kid from the Dunblane garden did that.
What tennis parents can take from this
1. Start with games, not drills. Judy’s first “coaching” was garden games for coordination and an indoor game where hitting hard was banned. For kids under 8, the goal isn’t technique — it’s athleticism and loving the feeling of a racquet in the hand. You can do this in a hallway.
2. A near-age hitting partner is worth more than a lesson. If you have two kids close in age, you have a training program. A regular hitting buddy — a slightly better junior they can chase — builds match toughness no drill replicates.
3. Don’t specialize early — and support the leap when they choose. Murray played four sports and nearly chose football. He picked tennis at 15–16, then went all in (Barcelona, full-time training). Early sampling didn’t delay him; it built the athlete. Keep the doors open until your kid picks one — even if “through it” means another country.
We’re parents, not coaches — this is what the story taught us, not a prescription.
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