WHEN it comes to preparing for Grand Slams, Andy Murray is known for his meticulousness, but the Scot admits he will have his hands full when the Nick Kyrgios circus comes to town in New York.

Murray, seeded three behind Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer, plays Kyrgios in round one of the US Open, and it is probably the toughest opening match he could have received in the draw. As he finalised his preparations here yesterday, Murray described his opponent as “an unbelievable talent” and is determined to focus only on matters on court and not the controversy that has surrounded the Australian over the past month.

“For me it’s just a tennis match,” Murray said yesterday of an encounter likely to be played on Tuesday night, potentially under the lights.

“I’ll just go about the match in the best way possible, by getting all the tactics and everything sorted. I’ll tailor my practices the next few days around his game style. That’s what I’ll be doing. You obviously don’t pay attention to the other stuff.”

The other stuff he refers to, of course, has dominated discussions in the press rooms around the Tour over the past few weeks.

In a moment of madness, at best, Kyrgios was captured by courtside microphones making a lewd comment about Stan Wawrinka’s girlfriend, the WTA player Donna Vekic.

It was an incident that left the Swiss so angry that he confronted Kyrgios in the locker-room, demanding an apology to him and to Vekic. It also led to total fines of $35,000 for the 20-year-old and a suspended one-month ban which will come into force if he receives more than $5000 in fines over the next six months.

Kyrgios said yesterday that he has apologised to Wawrinka and Vekic but he has been criticised by the likes of Federer and Rafael Nadal for his comments and is not exactly flavour of the month.

But as he contemplated his first-round match, Murray said he believed Kyrgios should be given a little room to learn from his mistakes.

“He’s a young guy and we all make mistakes,” he said. “Everyone … when they were 19, 20 did some bad things and made mistakes. For him it happens in front of millions of people.

“It’s wrong, a lot of the things he’s done, but I also think that he’s still a young guy and people mature, grow up at different rates. Not everyone’s exactly the same.

“He’ll learn. I don’t think he’s a bad guy. I don’t think he’s a bad person at all. He’s an unbelievably talented guy with a lot of potential. He’s going to be around the top of the game for a while.

“I think a little bit of patience is important when it comes to Nick, because he’s a young guy and it’s not easy growing up in the spotlight.”

Murray is unusual in the almost mentor-like role he has taken on with Kyrgios and his fellow Australian Thanasi Kokkinakis, practising with them and generally offering his advice on life growing up in the spotlight.

It’s a mark of his maturity and standing in the game that he feels happy doing this but Murray circa 2015 is in a “good place”.

Recently married and with his first child due in February, Murray is fully fit and playing some of his best tennis, winning the title in Montreal this month and reaching the semi-finals the week after in Cincinnati.

Helping Britain reach the semi-finals of the Davis Cup meant he played an extra week after Wimbledon and he had little time off before beginning his US hard-court swing in Washington.

But playing – and winning – so many matches this year has done so much for his confidence that any fatigue will be put out of his mind until his job is done here.

“It’s been busy,” Murray said. “There are obviously positives and negatives to that. I feel confident I’m hitting the ball well. I’ve played quite a lot of matches so my body is match-tight, which is good.

“I’ve also played a couple of long matches in the last few weeks as well, which is also physically very good preparation for here.

“It’s the last major of the year so obviously these next three or four weeks for me are a big few weeks, with the Davis Cup as well.”

Murray said he had not thought about whether playing Kyrgios would be his toughest first-round match.

But he knows to expect a difficult encounter, even if he has won all three of their previous meetings, all in straight sets, including at the French Open and Wimbledon this year.

“Every match is a new match,” Murray said. “You can obviously learn from previous matches and see what things worked and what things didn’t. But he might come in and do something completely different against me this time, so I need to be prepared for that. He’s quite an unpredictable player, so you need to expect that when you go on the court.

“I’ve played well against him the three times we’ve played, but he’s obviously a top player. He just missed out on a seeding here and I’m sure he’ll be one of the top players at this event in the next few years.”

Should the seedings go to plan, Murray will play Federer in the semi-finals and Djokovic in the final.

First he has to take care of Kyrgios. Murray said of their previous meetings: “I’ve played smart tennis, tried to come up with a game plan that’s made it tough for him. I’ve tried to mix my game up, but that’s my game style, something I’ve worked on the last 18 months or so. It’s worked well for me this year for sure and I’ll try to do the same here.”