Osaka grateful to 'super friendly' Murray for 'always checking' on her

Naomi Osaka says she is grateful to Andy Murray for “always checking” on her, especially when “all the hard stuff happens”.

Osaka is back on tour this season after giving birth to daughter Shai last July.

Ahead of returning to Indian Wells this week, where she is playing for just the second time since 2019, Osaka said Murray has always looked out for her.

“He’s always been super friendly to me coming up on the tour,” said Osaka.

“Whenever we bumped into each other, he’d say ‘hi’ because obviously, I am too shy to say ‘hi’.

“But I feel like he’s in a way always checking on me, like especially when all the hard stuff happens.”

He was asked afterwards whether he sees himself as a mentor to younger players.

“Not necessarily, I just know when I started on the tour, you’re obviously unbelievably excited to be playing on the tour but the locker room is a bit of a scary place,” he told Tennis Channel.

“You don’t know any of the players and it can be a little bit intimidating at times.

“I remember the players that were really nice to me when I first came on tour and how much that meant to me, and I remember the ones that weren’t [nice] as well, and that was tough as well when you are a young kid growing up and you have idols of yours who you watched on TV who are being pretty horrible to you, that’s not easy.

“If any of the players are going through tricky times I would always wish them well and hope they are doing better.”

Murray followed up by saying which players had been nice to him when he first started out.

“Jonas Bjorkman, he ended up coaching me for a while, I always remember him being nice. Tim Henman was very nice as well.

“[Andre] Agassi, who was my favourite player when I was growing up. I got to practice with him a few times.

“Brad Gilbert was coaching me at the beginning of my career… went out for dinner with him [Andre Agassi] a couple of times, he was always really nice.

“The vast majority of the players were really nice, but there were a few who weren’t, and I remember it.”

Murray also spoke about his favourite players to watch on the men’s and women’s tours.

“I love watching [Carlos] Alcaraz because of the way that he plays the game. He’s just got so much variety and power, and he tries stuff,” he said.

“He doesn’t always get it right, he makes mistakes, and that is also something that I enjoy. You never know what’s going to come next.

“I have always enjoyed watching [Gael] Monfils as well, and on the women’s side I love watching Iga [Swiatek], I think she’s brilliant to watch. She is my favourite player to watch on the female side.”