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Cape Town - Andy Murray insists that he will do his utmost to usurp Novak Djokovic as the world’s best tennis player in the remaining three events of the year.
Despite three grand slam triumphs, Murray has never been a world number one. However, all that could change in the coming months.
The equation is relatively simple.
For Murray to usurp Djokovic he needs to win the Erste Bank Open in Vienna this week – Djokovic is not competing.
Then at the Paris Masters 1000 event, more silverware for Murray and Djokovic being knocked out in the semi-finals or worse would keep the dream alive for the Scot.
Finally, at the ATP World Tour Finals, Murray would then simply need to achieve a better finish than Djokovic.
Sounds easy enough? Not quite. Murray is under no illusions as to just how well he will need to play to get it done in 2016.
"Novak's still got a pretty big lead in terms of points and he plays extremely well on the indoor hardcourts and has played in London whereas I've struggled a little bit so I've got to make some improvements this year if I want to get close to doing that,” Murray began.
"If you talk about getting to number one, it's not about individual tournaments, it's about a 12-month period and obviously you want to be consistent and get to the latter stages of as many tournaments as possible, which I've done the last few months and obviously I will try and do over the next few events if it's possible.
"It's not about one event, it's about a total season of 17, 18 tournaments and whoever performs best over them will get there and right now that's obviously Novak but I'll try my best to finish as strong as I can."
Murray begins his challenge in Vienna on Wednesday against Martin Klizan.
