	products recent interviews FastScripts archive about ASAP Sports

Our Clients:

Browse by Sport

Find us on

Subscribe to RSS

Click to go to
Asaptext.com

View our
e-Brochure

BNP PARIBAS MASTERS PARIS

November 2, 2016

Jo-Wilfried Tsonga

Paris, France

J. TSONGA/A. Ramos-Vinolas

6-3, 6-4

THE MODERATOR: Questions in English.

Q. You still have the chance to qualify for the ATP finals, but you have to go a long way. Are you thinking about that at all?
JO-WILFRIED TSONGA: No, I'm not thinking about it at all. I'm thinking about my next match for the moment which will be a double. And the next one is gonna be the singles. I'm really focused on that.

I think the match tomorrow is already enough important, I mean, to think about it and only think about it.

Q. You looked very relaxed on center court today. Did you feel relaxed?
JO-WILFRIED TSONGA: Yeah, I feel relaxed. That's the last tournament of the year for the moment, and for me, you know, that's the last tournament so I will give my best.

I'm just relaxed because I'm feeling good. I'm playing good tennis. I hope I will continue to play good tennis and hope to win.

Q. Some players are very intense. Do you feel you play your best tennis with a smile on your face and feeding off the crowd cheering you on?
JO-WILFRIED TSONGA: Yeah, I think I played my best tennis like this. We are all different, I think. All the best guys, they all do differently. And that's it. The most important thing is to believe in yourself, and that's it.

Q. Some players feel they play their best tennis when they have home support. Some feel the pressure and therefore they don't play their best. Which do you fall into?
JO-WILFRIED TSONGA: I think I won most of my tournaments here in France, so I will say for me it's good. I always played well, you know, in Roland Garros, for example. I don't play really well, you know, in clay court usually, but during Roland Garros I always play well.

And also in Bercy and the other tournaments in France, I won them two times, so for me it's really positive to be here in front of my home crowd.

Q. Could you just tell me how you prepare for the next match? You and Kei play many times.
JO-WILFRIED TSONGA: To be honest, I'm already prepared. Yeah, I'm feeling good. I will just come on court and try to win it.

THE MODERATOR: Questions in French.

Q. You were in Vienna where you felt very good physically and you were playing well. Did you find the same feelings when you got here?
JO-WILFRIED TSONGA: Yes. I was feeling good on the court today, and I had very good stats, especially for my serve. It had been a long time, I hadn't served that well. I think it's the best serving games I have played for many years, and I played a good match today.

I expected it -- well, the previous matches were tighter, so I expected it to be tough, but this match went even better. So starting the tournament in this manner is extremely good for me. As a player, I was not always able to play tournaments back to back. Every time I had a good result in one tournament, the next one didn't go so well. So now I would like to have a better tournament.

Q. When you're talking about your serve, you're talking about your first-serve percentage? You were at 80% at a certain stage.
JO-WILFRIED TSONGA: Yes, I'm talking about my first serves. But the aces, too. He was disturbed by my serve. He couldn't read my serve.

So this is good, a good feeling. I would like to have the same stats in the following matches for my serve.

Q. You changed your movement for your serve. What process did you follow for this change? Of course you had a pain in your knee. Why did you do that just after the US Open?
JO-WILFRIED TSONGA: I have no regrets. I leave that to the others. We don't have time to look back. We are all going to finish in the same box at the end, so I'm just moving forward.

What I'm interested in is what is happening now or what is going to happen tomorrow. What happened before doesn't count.

I think at a certain stage you should be wise enough to change things and also be smart to change things. I don't like when things never change. When you win, it's okay if it doesn't change. But if things don't progress, you have to change things.

This is something I changed, and immediately it was very positive. So now I'm keeping it up, and I hope I can even still improve my serve further.

Q. So now you are convinced it was the right choice? Because after US Open you were not sure it was a good solution.
JO-WILFRIED TSONGA: It was not a choice. More or less it was something vital. Well, I can't say that exactly, but vital for my tennis, anyway. I was not able to play match after match, because my knee was hurting and I was maybe making too many efforts with my knee.

But it's not only that that helped my knee, I mean, changing my serve. I did other things. I changed my serve recently. So I don't know yet if it's going to last. I don't know if my physical trainers are going to keep bothering me, but, anyway, I hope I can still have good results and I hope I can still have ambitions, because at a certain stage I was getting tired and I thought I can't do better than what I did, given the conditions.

So the fact that now I feel better is allowing me for having other ambitions.

Q. Congratulations that you're going to become a father soon. Does that maybe help you step back from the tour? Are you thinking, you know, next spring I'll be a father? Do you approach tennis differently?
JO-WILFRIED TSONGA: Of course you approach tennis differently, a little. All along my career I changed, I evolved. Now I'm in a period where I'm really stepping back and having a new perspective, and I think the important thing is what I want to do, and becoming a father now is going to change this perspective, of course.

It's not only me anymore. I'll have to conciliate a family life and traveling all over the place, being away a lot.

But it's extremely positive. I'm very happy. I really hope I'll be able to do both as well as possible.

Q. A practical question about tomorrow's match. To beat Kei, you need to serve well. Is it going to be a key tomorrow? How do you approach that match? You are playing a top 4 that has a tough game for you.
JO-WILFRIED TSONGA: I like none of the top 4 players, anyway. They are all difficult to beat. But this is something I did already, and I beat Kei already and I think it's going to be important for me to serve well but also to be solid in the game, to be aggressive, to show him that the match is going to be tough for him and that I will be present on the court.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297