IT'S only a matter of weeks since the fear-mongers were climbing to the pulpit to tell him his game had gone to the dogs.

Mere weeks later, after a testing but arguably the most uplifting fortnight he's had since the high summer of 2013, Andy Murray is looking forward to some canine recuperation.

The Australian Open runner-up has plenty on his plate - including finding a stand-in coach for the double-booked Amelie Mauresmo - but first he's looking forward to a break. And while his campaign in Melbourne may have come to a dispiriting end as he again ran out of steam against the imperious Novak Djokovic, the positives emphatically outweighed the negatives.

"I've spent two and a half days at home in the last two and a half months, so I'm looking forward to getting back and spending a bit of time at home with my friends and family and my dogs and being away from the tennis court and the gym for a few days when I get back," said Murray yesterday.

"The slams do take a lot out of you physically and mentally because of the length of the matches, and then also the length of the event and the preparation that goes into them."

But that preparation with Mauresmo paid off handsomely Down Under as Murray confounded expectations in spectacularly breaking out of a slump that could be charted almost all the way back to his victory at Wimbledon two years ago. Murray ended 2014 winning just one of 13 games against Roger Federer and finished matters in Melbourne suffering the same depressing sequence at the hands of Djokovic.

But the performances in the ATP World Tour Finals and Sunday's Australian Open final were "night and day", he insisted.

"There's been a great couple of weeks compared with where I was a couple of months ago. It's like night and day really," said Murray. "I'm playing way, way better in almost every part of my game. Moving better. Physically I feel better, more confident, more belief. I was a lot calmer before my matches. Mentally I felt much, much stronger than I did at the end of last year and during the majors really last year. So for me a lot of positives."

The 27-year-old believes his traditional winter training regime in Florida and the time he was able to spend with Mauresmo paid dividends as he advanced to the final for the loss of just two sets.

"It's pleasing to be back playing close to my best," added Murray. "And it does show that still feel like I can make improvements in my game. I still think I can get a few per cent better over the next couple of months.

"Obviously in the last couple of months I've had a lot of time to work on things with Amelie, also physically as well with my team. It's easy for me to sit here and say what I think that she helped with, but everyone in here watched my matches here. I feel like it was a completely different player on the court."

Mauresmo left Melbourne in the early hours of yesterday due to her commitments as France's Fed Cup captain and Murray admitted he would like to bring in a temporary coach in her absence this month.

"I'll definitely have a think about it, because I don't want to go the whole month now not seeing anyone," he said. "But it's about getting the right person rather than rushing and making a bad decision."