Despite my rather desperate attempt to be upbeat about today (see below), January 22nd has been dubbed by some self appointed expert thee most depressing day of the year.  And I slept very badly (the usual abreaction to an accupunture treatment.  I still have touching faith it has a long term affect of making me better).

Nevertheless, the tennis cheered me up.  For four hours - until almost 3pm - 2am Tuesday in Melbourne - BBC-2 realyed the spellbinding match between Raphael Nadal and Andy Murray.

Long-term readers of this blog may recall I confessed to a homophobic crush on Rapha during last year's Wimbledon.  He ability never to give up, to get every ball is prodigious - but Murray matched a lot of this.  Incredible rallies, angled shots. The 6-1 first set score didn't reflect how close the Scot (lease pleasing to watch, but very inventive and varied in his game) came to winning.

Andy Murray is the first UK player in my lifetime who plays tennis and not 'British'.  He never creates the impression that when he wins it's only as a prelude to failure.  One is never tempted to crouch behind the sofa in embarassment.  He's nothing like Hemman, Jeremy Bates before him. Mottram, Virginia Wade...    He's nothing like most of British sport.

Still, I'm glad Rapha Nadal won.  Not my pin-up, but my hero.  Courage, concentration, adaptabily and persistence (aka patience) are  qualities I'd like to have more of.  Unfortunately I've passed the optimm age for wearing a cut-off tee shirt