A collection of video clips emerged yesterday of Andy Murray on a practice court: something we haven’t seen since he underwent hip surgery on January 8th.

Murray travelled to Nice over the weekend, where he will be spending the coming week at the new Mouratoglou Tennis Academy. It is understood that he had previously hit a few balls at Raynes Park, a facility in south-west London that belongs to the All England Club. But after a couple of months in the gym, this trip to France still represents the moment when his on-court training begins in earnest.

The clips show Murray in Nice working on an outdoor hard court with three long-standing members of his team: coach Jamie Delgado, who manned the other end of the court during a few drills, as well as fitness trainer Matt Little and physio Shane Annun.

Anyone hoping that Murray’s surgery would provide an instant cure might be dismayed by the extent to which his movement remains impaired. During the drills, Delgado would hit a deep ball into one of the corners of the court, and then a short one for Murray to sprint forward to. He was clearly labouring, but then this is the start of a lengthy process, and we can hardly expect him to look razor-sharp from the off.