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Barry Cowan: Andy Murray needs "a clean slate"

Barry Cowan urges Great Britain's number one Andy Murray to hire a "super coach" for the good of his career.

Former British tennis player Barry Cowan has expressed his belief that the time is right for Andy Murray to reassess his coaching situation.

On the back of his amicable split with Ivan Lendl, Murray struggled for form in the major tournaments throughout the 2014 campaign under the guidance of new coach Amelie Mauresmo.

Following his hefty 6-0 6-1 defeat at the hands of Roger Federer at the ATP World Tour Finals in London last week, Cowan has insisted that the two-time Grand Slam winner has lost a lot of belief, that will only be rediscovered by the recruitment of a "super coach".

"He's got an incredible backroom staff, great trainers, great physios but I think at Andy's age of 27 it's the perfect time to make a few adjustments. It's not going to happen with Lendl coming back. In the era of super coaches, there's talk of the great work that they've done," Cowan told Sky Sports News.

"When Andy split with Lendl I felt Mats Wilander would be a great candidate just to improve certain aspects of his game and also to get him to believe that he can beat the very best again. [Against Federer], I didn't get the impression in the way that Andy played that he truly believed he could win that match.

"The big question mark that you can't escape is his record against the top players is poor. Some of the big matches, he didn't really show up at the start. He needs to address that. When he was with Ivan Lendl for that Wimbledon final, anyone who was there or watched it, thought 'this is a different Andy Murray'. He looked ready to win."

Murray's best performance at a Grand Slam in 2014 came at the French Open, where he reached the semi-finals in Paris.

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Britain's Andy Murray reacts to losing a point against Bulgaria's Grigor Dimitrov during their men's singles quarter-final match on day nine of the 2014 Wimbledon Championships at The All England Tennis Club in Wimbledon, southwest London, on July 2, 2014
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