We’ve known for months that Andy Murray was edging closer to hitting his final tennis ball in anger.
We are now just days away from this monumental moment.
Paris 2024 will be Murray’s final-ever tennis tournament and for so many tennis lovers, his retirement will be as traumatic as they come.
Indeed, it seemed that until just weeks ago, retirement would be an unwelcome trauma for Murray himself. He is now, though, he insists, comfortable with the thought of retirement.
In the course of his almost two decade-long professional career, Murray scaled the very highest heights; he won three grand slam titles, including two Wimbledon crowns, became world number one in the strongest era that men’s tennis has ever seen and won two Olympic gold medals.
But he also experienced the lowest of lows, with the Scot battling serious injury all too often in the latter stages of his career.
Since swapping his normal hip with a metal one in early 2019, Murray has been desperately trying to eek every last drop out a career that he clearly didn’t want to end.
Within days however, his career will be over.
At Paris 2024, Murray will play his final-ever competitive tennis match.
Injury has deemed that a tilt at a third singles gold medal is a step too far but in the doubles event, alongside Dan Evans, Murray will have his final hurrah.
The phrase “end of an era” is over-used in the sporting world but in Murray’s case, it’s entirely fitting.
In the coming days, we will see the curtain close for good on the career of Scotland’s greatest-ever sportsperson.
From a tennis perspective, Murray is remarkable.
For a kid from Dunblane to become a world-class tennis player, never mind one of the greatest ever, is astonishing.
And the statistics from his professional career are breathtaking.
As well as the three grand slams, two Olympics golds and one Davis Cup, Murray spent over four years within the world’s top three despite the fact his career overlapped with three of the very greatest players of all-time – Roger Federer, Rafa Nadal and Novak Djokovic.
He won 14 Masters 1000 titles (the highest grade of tournament outside the grand slams), which is more than Pete Sampras, Stan Wawrinka, Juan Martin Del Potro and Nick Kyrgios combined.
In the open era, no player has won more grand slam matches from two sets to love down than Murray.
And he’s the only player on the planet to have seven or more career wins over each of the Big Three of Federer, Nadal and Djokovic.
So, Murray’s stature as a tennis player is indisputable.
But it’s his moral compass that is perhaps even more remarkable than anything he achieved on a tennis court.
In elite sport, morals are, all too often, sadly and glaringly lacking.
Murray was the exception.
In a world in which male athletes are frequently oblivious to their privilege, Murray consistently and vociferously stood up for female athletes.
From hiring a female coach in Amelie Mauresmo to regularly voicing his admiration of particular female players to unfailingly correcting journalists who erased the achievements of female players, Murray stood alone in the male game in supporting female players so unflinchingly.
Similarly, elite sport is often a bubble in which athletes talk a good game in terms of standing up for human rights – until they’re offered a bucketful of money to play in particular locations, that is.
However, Murray put his money where his mouth is and never once played an exhibition match in Saudi Arabia, a stance neither Nadal nor Djokovic have been willing to take.
The acclaim in which Murray is held by the press and the public is clear – the past few weeks, as it’s become obvious that his career was coming to a close, saw a tsunami of well-wishes to a man who has cemented his place in the record books.
But far more telling than the reception his retirement announcement had from outsiders was the way his fellow players reacted to it.
The flood of tributes to Murray from both past and present players says far more about the Scot than any number of words written in newspapers can.
For good or for bad, athletes can put on an act with the media; their public-facing persona can be hugely different from their private-facing one.
So, for Murray’s peers to revere him in the way they clearly do is a mark of the man.
The locker room is where sportspeople are at their most exposed, and with Murray having been a constant fixture there for almost 20 years, his true personality will have been scrutinised.
And he’s passed that test with flying colours; in a sport in which almost complete selfishness is required, Murray gathered countless friends and admirers.
That says it all.
It goes without saying that Scotland is unlikely to produce a player to rival the quality of Andy Murray for generations, and it’s possible, probable even, that we never will.
That's a reflection of Murray’s greatness rather than a slight on anyone who comes after him.
There is no perfect way for an athlete to retire, particularly for an athlete like Murray who has been so reluctant to forgo the life of a professional sportsperson.
But walking away in the shadow of the Olympic rings is as perfect as it could get for Murray.
For tennis purists, his brace of Wimbledon titles is likely to be considered his most significant achievement but in so many ways, the Olympics embody Murray.
From the team element which he relishes to way his maiden gold medal in 2012 proved to be the catalyst to him becoming a grand slam champion to his second gold medal in 2016, which could be considered his final great tournament win, the Olympic Games has played a monumental part in Murray’s career.
And so it’s fitting that, for someone who has clearly found making peace with retirement so difficult, he’ll walk away from Paris 2024 content.
