Andy Murray believes the decline of Novak Djokovic has been exaggerated and insists the Serb is just a victim of his own success
Novak Djokovic, Andy Murray
Novak Djokovic
Melbourne: Andy Murray believes the decline of Novak Djokovic has been exaggerated and insists the Serb is just a victim of his own success.
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Murray beat Sam Querrey to move into the Australian Open fourth round yesterday, less than 24 hours after Djokovic had crashed out to wildcard Denis Istomin.
Andy Murray
Asked why he thought Djokovic was struggling, Murray said: "I mean, struggling by the highest standards. But compared with most players, it's not been that bad really.
"I think for him the early loss at Wimbledon and here would be disappointing. He'd want to play his best in the majors. But he won the Masters Series in Canada. He was in the final at the US Open. He won in Doha last week.
"He has played some really good stuff over the last six or seven months too. It's just not been as consistent as what it was the three years before. "But how anyone is expected to keep up that level for their whole career, it's just unreasonable to expect that of anyone. There's been a couple of surprising results, for sure, but on the whole, it's not been that bad."
The Scot insists he is not feeling any extra pressure as a result of his rival's defeat. "I was surprised. Novak's record here speaks for itself. But for me, it doesn't change anything unless I was to reach the final because I can't play Novak in the fourth round or in the third round. I don't worry about that really," Murray added.