How Can Murray Catch Djokovic For no 1 Spot?

Andy Murray has become no 2 player in the world for the first time after 2009, when he remained at this spot for very short period of four weeks only.  He overtook Federer’s no 2 spot this week by winning second Miami master title last week.  Now when Federer is declining with age and Nadal is at no 5 spot it is a great possibility that he will remain at this spot for a long time.  For Murray the no 2 spot is not the finish line.  He is now looking to take over Djokovic to become no 1 player in the world for the first time in his career.  This is not an easy fate to achieve but he can achieve this goal if he show an epic display at clay court season especially in the presence of in form Nadal. 

Ranking and points released by Atp on 1 April 2013 are as follows:

            Name & Nationality              Ranking Points

1)      Novak Djokovic(Srb)               12370

2)      Andy Murray(Gbr)                   8750

3)      Roger Federer (Sui)                 8670

4)      David Ferrer     (Esp)                7050

5)      Rafael Nadal    (Esp)                6385

6)      Tomas Berdych(Cze)                5145

7)      Juan Martin Del Potro               4750

According to these stats Murray is ahead of Federer by just minor lead of just 80 points.  Also he is far behind than that of Djokovic by huge 3620.  David Ferrer is at the best position in his career especially with increasing age but his win-loss record against top three is not so much impressive.  Nadal’s ranking can fall down more and more because he has to defend a huge amount of ranking points at this clay court season.  He has to defend Monte Carlo, Barcelona, Rome and French open.  If he suffers an early exit in one or more these tournaments his will lose his ranking points because he nothing to gain at clay court season except at Madrid Masters, where he lost to Verdesco last year in 3^rd round. 

As far as Federer’s ranking is concerned I don’t think he will slip from no 3 ranking until Wimbledon because David Ferrer never defeat Federer in his career and also he has worst record against Nadal but a little bit good record against Murray.  He David Ferrer want to achieve no 3 ranking he has to win bigger tournaments.  And to do this he has to defeat two or three top players, which he could never do.  However Federer can lose most of ranking points due to early exits in coming tournaments.  If his performance remains as it was at the start of the year, he will surely lose his no 3 ranking also.  Because he is defending champion at Madrid and he was semi finalist at Rome and French open last year(lost to Djokovic in both).

Now coming back to Murray’s possibility to gain no 1 spot, there is a possibility that he can achieve this splendid goal in 2013.  For this he has to show his best performance of his career in clay court season.  Clay had been the worst surface for Andy Murray he did not won title on clay for many years.  All of his titles are either on grass or hard courts.  In 2012 he did not perform well in clay court season, therefore he have to defend only fraction of points as compared to Djokovic.  He lost in quarters of Monte Carlo by Berdych, in quarters of Barcelona by Raonic, 3^rd round of Rome by Gasquet and quarter finals of French open by David Ferrer.  Also he did not participated in Madrid masters last year.  So he has to defend just 720 points.  Therefore, he has very minor points to lose but he can gain a stack of points in coming tournaments.  If he plays at Barcelona(which is doubtful), then he will play for 5500 points out of which he can add 4280 more points to his ranking.  

On the other hand Djokovic has to defend 2580 points to defend out of 5000 points for which he will fight.  If Murray shows best performance of his life here and wins one or more tournaments here and finishes at least runner up in clay tournaments.  Then there is a great possibility that he can catch Djokovic.  But for this there should be early exits of Djokovic in two or more tournaments.  It depends upon the luck of Murray that will decide that either Murray goes deep into the draw or not.  Because king of clay will be there.  And he will be 5^th seed there and he can face big four in quarters.  So Murray have to avoid Nadal to go deep in these tournaments.  If he wins French open 2013 that will surely climb him up to no 1 spot, but at first he has to play grinding tennis in pre French open tournaments.