Sort out his team?
Murray said that the people around him are doing their jobs properly. “I’ve got my tactics for the matches but I’m not sticking to them, which is one of my strengths,” he said. “I haven’t done that part well for the past few weeks, but it’s not the fault of the guys I work with.”

Someone — that should be Miles Maclagan, his coach — needs to tell him to play with his chin in the air, not on his chest. Murray’s body language against Fish — indeed in most recent matches — was horribly defeatist.

Have one coach, not two?
Maclagan is Murray’s full-time coach but Alex Corretja, the Spaniard, turns up now and again. There can be too many voices. Look at Djokovic. Marian Vajda, his coach, is not in the United States, where Todd Martin took over temporarily. Djokovic suffered dreadful losses in Indian Wells and Miami.

Employ a sports psychologist?
“The only person who knows what’s going on inside my head is me,” Murray said. When he was coached by Brad Gilbert three years ago, he used a sports psychologist for a while, but it did not last long.

Stop talking about British tennis?
It has been a recurring theme since the loss to Lithuania in the Davis Cup, which has become the catalyst for the debate on the ills of the domestic game. Tit-for-tat exchanges with John Lloyd, the erstwhile captain, have taken a toll.

Start playing with more purpose
“In the past couple of years I’ve come off court feeling proud of the way I had fought because it’s not all about how you play, it’s being at your best mentally,” he said. “I’ve tried hard in these matches but struggled with my focus.”

Perhaps he is analysing too much in matches — he does not seem to know whether to hit his forehand with purpose or to rally. That is bound to affect his competitiveness. “Sometimes I am positive, sometimes negative, then stuck in the middle. I need to change.”

Forget about the Australian Open final
Murray was commended for his tennis and his reaction to defeat by Roger Federer in Melbourne — “I can cry like you, Roger, I just wish I could play like you,” will be a part of his epitaph — but the tears have to dry. “I don’t think I’m still thinking about it,” he said.

This time last year, when Federer cracked his racket and was in a state of mental turmoil, his authority over the game was questioned. The Swiss has since won the French Open, Wimbledon, the Australian Open and reached the final of the US Open. What better example for Murray to follow.