Murray keen to improve tennis ranking

Madrid, May 11: Andy Murray is proud of his new world number three ranking, achieved for the first time Monday as the Scot prepares for his start at the Madrid Masters.But the 21-year-old is hoping for more to come and won`t be satisfied with a British best as his skyrocketing career lifts to greater heights "I`d be prouder if my name was in the middle of them (Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer)," said Murray. "I`ve been on a very good run the last eight or nine months, I think the ranking reflects that." "To get close to those two or to get in between Roger and Rafa is a tough thing to do. They have had the top two spots for the last five or six years. It`s an incredible run that both of them have been on." "I`d love to try to break that up but I need to try to focus on just winning matches." The fourth seed at the new event was searching for court time at the Magic Box complex where a majority of the clay practise courts do not yet seem to be ready for action. He is awaiting a second-round opponent from Italian Simon Bolelli and Argentine qualifier Juan Ignacio Chela. "I just tried to get here as early as possible to get used to the altitude, obviously the courts here are brand new and a little bit different," Murray said. "It`s been quite tough to get practise time because there has only been two practice courts. I think one or two of them actually broke yesterday." "I just got here early, had some decent practise and hopefully everything will be OK for the first match." Murray said that he can`t let tatus affect his concentration. "It´s one of those things that if you start focussing on the ranking or on what another player is doing you take your eye off the ball a little bit." "I know how I´ve got a chance of overtaking Roger if I can play very well the next couple of months. The most important thing is to concentrate on playing well and not the ranking." On court, American Mardy Fish continued the base he laid last week with an Estoril quarter-final, reaching the second round over Serb Janko Tipsarevic 7-6 (7/3), 6-4. Spain`s Oscar Hernandez beat Martin Vassallo Arguello of Argentina 6-3, 6-3 and Frenchman Florent Serra put out German Wimbledon semi-finalist Rainer Schuettler 6-2, 6-4. In women`s play, Peng Shuai of China defeated Russian Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova 6-1, 7-6 (7/2). Bureau Report