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It is the age old mantra: one match at a time.

As mantras go, it is not that exciting and it does leave a chill in the hearts of the ravening wolves of the press pack (and if you think out inter-personal skills need some work, you should see our table manners). One match at a time – get a headline out of that if you can.

Andy Murray is almost apologetic for trotting out the dog-eared old saying but, as he points out, he is an experienced hand at this Grand Slam lark. He has been on the professional circuit for a dozen years and, as a former champion of both Wimbledon and the US Open, he knows exactly what it takes to survive seven best-of-five set matches and emerge victorious at the end. The trick, it turns out, is to be as boring as a very boring, boring thing. Sorry everyone.

“Take it one match at a time,” Murray said. “I know everyone goes, ‘Oh, that's boring.’ But that's what you do as a professional. My job's to try to win my next match; it's not thinking about anything else.”

Following the departure of Novak Djokovic, there has been a hustling and a bustling to fill the space left behind him in the draw. Who will seize the opportunity? Who will make a bolt for the final?

Murray, safely tucked away on the other side of that draw is keeping out of all that. As he has pointed out on numerous occasions, none of it concerns him unless he gets to the final. And, at the moment, he is two matches – two huge matches – away from that.

But outside the Wimbledon bubble, the rest of the country does not see it quite like that. No Djokovic? It’s Murray’s to lose then.

For the man in question, if not a case of “If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs” (as the Kipling quotation reads in the All England Club clubhouse), it is more about keeping your head down and making a swift exit when the over-enthusiastic lose touch with reality. Murray’s immediate reality is an appointment with Jo-Wilfried Tsonga on Wednesday and that is more than enough to dealing with for the minute.

“I'm fully aware of how difficult my next opponent is,” he said. “I know Tsonga is one of the best grass court players in the world. If he plays well, I'm not on my game, I can lose that match for sure. So I need to make sure I have a good practice, stay focused on that one.

“He's a really, really good grass court player - very, very dangerous. I played him here a couple of times before. Both matches were hard. They weren't easy. A few of the sets came down to just a couple of points. I'm aware I'll have to be playing at my highest level to win.”

Those matches may have been tough but Murray did win them. Overall, he leads their rivalry with 12 wins to two losses and in terms of their grass court match-up, he has won all five of their meetings. And Murray knows that he is playing well on the green stuff this summer. Already the champion of Queen’s Club, he has not dropped a set on his way to his ninth consecutive quarter-final in SW19. Things are going well so far.

Journée de préparation pour les quarts demain #Wimbledon #TsongaTeam pic.twitter.com/zMHSMmyhig

— Jo-Wilfried Tsonga (@tsonga7) July 5, 2016

“I think, if I play the level I'm playing at just now, I give myself a chance in most matches,” he said. “But the trick is to keep that up, to maintain that level for the whole two weeks. I've done a good job of it so far. I do feel like when I've needed to in the tournament, I have played some good tennis.”

As for the hype and the hoop-la, the expectation and the pressure, that is water off a duck’s back for the champion of 2013. “In terms of dealing with everything else, I've been dealing with it for years,” he said. “I feel no different this year to any other year when I played here.”

One match at a time: it may not make much of a headline but it might just win Murray another Wimbledon title.