Andy Murray: My tears at Wimbledon earned the public's respect

'They respected me for letting off the pressure cooker of emotion and for letting the mask slip,' says the Wimbledon champion

Murray says many men feel unable to express their inner thoughts and do not feel they can let the so-called 'mask slip' (Getty)

Andy Murray has suggested his tearful response to losing the Wimbledon finals in 2012 earned him the respect of the public because they were able to see his emotional side.

The Wimbledon champion broke down in tears after losing his first Wimbledon final and also became tearful after his victory this year.

The Scot said playing tennis was an emotionally exhausting job and admitted he had sometimes found it difficult to contain his anger in his younger years and this had not helped his performance on the court.

Murray is now using his experiences to raise awareness about the importance of men opening up about their emotions. Taking on the role of Guest Editor of Huffington Post, he has become involved in their project Building Model Men. Murray will be working alongside CALM, a charity dedicated to preventing male suicide, to explore why men often remain reluctant to seek help for their mental health problems and explore the stories of people overcoming challenges they face.

“Whether I’m winning or losing there’s a huge amount going on under the surface. The pressure is always there and quite honestly, at times it’s hard to hide,” he wrote in a piece for the publication.

“In my younger years, I sometimes struggled to manage what was going on in my head. Moments of anger or frustration would spill out and it rarely helped me win. But when I cried on the center court at Wimbledon after losing to Roger Federer, some people saw me in a different light.”

“People didn’t laugh or think less of me, it was the opposite. It felt like they respected me more. They respected me for letting off the pressure cooker of emotion and for letting the mask slip.”

Murray argued many men feel unable to express their inner thoughts and do not feel they can let the so-called mask slip. “Many men express their stresses and emotions in self-destructive and sometimes life-ending ways. They build up emotion and don’t have the tools to deal with what’s going on in their lives," he said.

Suicide remains a growing problem for men and in every country in the world, male suicides outnumber female suicides. In Britain, men are three times more likely to end their own lives than women and suicide remains the most common cause of death in men under the age of 45.

The Building Modern Men series is releasing a video titled ‘Boys Do Cry’ which includes Bond villain Mads Mikkelsen, Robert Peston, Alastair Campbell, Joe Wicks and Twin Atlantic describing the last time they cried.