USO: Monday

01 September, 2009 | 03:09

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So, Andy gets his US Open started against Ernests Gulbis on Tuesday night. He's second after 7pm on Arthur Ashe - early hours of the morning UK time - and Sky Sports will have live coverage. Poor you if you're cutting caffeine out of your diet.

So how did he prepare the day before? With an hour and a half hit at the tournament site. They did start with - yep you guessed it - tennis-football. Matt Little warms up his troublesome back in preparation.

The split between proper tennis and tennis football was something around the 50/50 mark on monday. Andy concentrating hard on what would be a non-forfeit day for him...

Format for the hitting was Andy vs. Miles and Rosco Hutchins. Physio Andy Ireland looks on from the back fence...

At the other end competition to hit a winner is fierce, albeit a little lighthearted.

Having run round Central Park before work, strength and conditioning coach Jez Green feels no guilt about standing still....

Not much standing still at Andy's end of the court as the 2 vs. 1 continued.

That drill done, they fine-tuned some other stuff. So we had volleys...

And we had serves....

And once that was all done and dusted, we had some jumps too.

If you're wondering what Jez Green is doing on court, we can explain. Dinner last night was dominated by a discussion as to how many points each of the team members might win against Andy. Jez, who played to a decent standard in his youth, reckoned he'd hold his own.

Only way to test the theory was to stick him at the net and see how he dealt with some returns.

Turns out he didn't do too badly at all. Make of his technique what you will....

He put enough volleys away to merit fist pump. One return very nearly took his head off though...

Tournament starts tomorrow, and everyone's looking forward to that...