Wimbledon 2012: Does Andy Murray Have What It Takes To Win The Championships?

Does Andy Murray Have What It Takes To Win Wimbledon?

The 25-year-old Scot is the first British man to reach the final in 74 years - but the question on everyone's lips will be can he now go all the way and lift the winner's trophy at the Wimbledon championships?

In the past three years, he was defeated at the semi-final stage, but the Dunblane-born star now has victory in his sights.

He certainly has the right characteristics - a steely determination that has led to some, perhaps unfairly, accusing him of lacking emotion, and a strong competitive streak.

Andy Murray has been accused of being dour, but for many it is this determined grit which has allowed him to make it so far in competitive tennis

His junior coach Leon Smith spotted that in a five-year-old Murray, describing him as being "unbelievably competitive" when he first saw him wield a tennis racket in 1993, the schoolboy having been training in the local tennis club that was 200 yards from his front door.

Some of that spirit comes from a gene pool that included grandfather Roy Erskine who played professional football for Hibernian, Stirling Albion and Cowdenbeath. Murray himself almost went down the football route, turning Rangers down when they offered to sign him at the age of 13.

Some of Murray's grit must come from the challenges he has had to overcome in his life, such as experiencing the Dunblane massacre of 1996, when Thomas Hamilton killed 17 people, mostly children, at the local primary school before turning a gun on himself.

Murray, who was eight at the time, has always been reluctant to talk about the ordeal but, in his autobiography Hitting Back, he describes attending a youth group run by Hamilton and the fact his mother Judy used to give him lifts in her car.

Andy Murray's mother, Judy Murray, the Great Britain Fed Cup captain, has been ever present during her son's tennis career - well, apart from when watching Britain's leading female players during this year's tournament.

Then there was the separation of his parents when he was nine, which saw Murray and his brother Jamie go to live with their father Willie.

Yet the Murray steel also comes from growing up in the shadow of his older brother amid a sibling rivalry that spilled onto the tennis court.

As a youngster, Jamie was rated the second-best junior player in the world and beating him became Andy's greatest motivation.

When the younger brother's first victory finally came, in an under-12s final in Solihull, Andy taunted Jamie so much he received a rap on the hand so hard he lost a nail.

Pushing the boundaries, fuelled by an inner fire to be the best, came naturally to Murray.

Fred Perry was the last British man to win the Wimbledon championship

It is why he did not go down the usual route, which would have taken him through the Lawn Tennis Association and all the failure associated with that organisation.

Instead, in his mid-teens he headed for Spain, having reasoned a young Rafael Nadal was training with Carlos Moya, then the world number one, while he was hitting balls with brother Jamie.

Murray moved to Barcelona, where he trained on the clay courts of the Sanchez-Casal Academy. He put up with the homesickness, and his academic studies also suffered, but in terms of his tennis education, it could not have been better.

At an impressionable age, Murray was brushing shoulders with success rather than failure and, when he won the junior US Open in 2004, it was obvious a star was in the making. Murray also became BBC Young Sports Personality of the Year as a result, and was the youngest ever player to represent Britain in the Davis Cup.

He reached his first grand slam semi-final at the 2008 US Open, putting Nadal to the sword, but lost in the final to an imperious Federer - the opponent he will face again on Sunday.

In recent years, Murray has got through a large number of coaches but hiring eight-time grand slam winner Ivan Lendl at the end of last year may prove to be his most canny move yet.

Lendl has become a familiar figure on the side of the courts this year, joining the other members of Team Murray.

Her passion and support are unmistakable but she has insisted she is no pushy mum, something her son has backed her up on.

Kim Sears, Murray's long-time girlfriend with whom he shares a home in Surrey, has also been a regular fixture at his matches, her glamorous look attracting comparisons with the Duchess of Cambridge.

Murray's glamorous girlfriend Kim Sears

The Scot may even have someone supporting him from on high, judging from the gesture that has become his trademark celebration over the past week, which sees him looking up and pointing to the sky with his index fingers.

Murray is more than capable of winning a grand slam, and Wimbledon especially with the home crowd behind him. Surely now is the time for the best British player since Fred Perry to get his hands on some well-deserved silverware.

Take a look at some pictures from Friday's historic match:

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