	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

AUSTRALIAN OPEN

January 14, 2017

Bernard Tomic

Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

THE MODERATOR: Questions, please.

Q. How would you sum up your preparations?
BERNARD TOMIC: Pretty good. I was practicing very well. And, yeah, I got a bunch of exhibitions in, so it was important for me get matches regardless of win/loss.

I'm feeling pretty confident. I play a tough player first round here, so it's going to be a tough match. He's not easy to play for me, so I have to get ready for this match with all my effort.

Q. You expect he'll make you work pretty hard? Is that the way he goes about it?
BERNARD TOMIC: Yeah, he's very intense. He's beaten a lot of top players. I think he's reached almost top 20 in the world, won multiple titles. For me he's a top 10, 15 player on clay. It's going to be tough.

His ranking now is 60, 70. He's one of those players, where he's playing well, he's not an easy player to play.

I have to come into this match 100% from the first point. That's going to be very important for me, you know.

Q. What do you make of your draw more generally?
BERNARD TOMIC: Yeah, I saw the first two matches potentially. It's tough. Everybody in the first round can play. I don't look any more further ahead. The times I've looked further ahead, I've sort of lost. I think you have to respect everyone. Everybody can beat everybody here. It's a Grand Slam. Everyone is playing to win, playing for themselves at the best level. They've prepared at their best.

For me this first round is important. After that I'll see who I play, but I really don't care.

Q. It's going to be hot, Monday and Tuesday.
BERNARD TOMIC: It's not going to be easy. I just have to deal with it. It's going to be the same for everybody on that day. Tuesday is going to be tough. I have to be hydrated, ready. We've seen many times here at the Open where people are not physically ready, have to withdraw. It gets sometimes out of hand sometimes with the heat. It's something you have to play, not just the opponent, but the heat. I guess I have to be ready for this.

Q. There's been a lot spoken about your fitness. Where would you rank it out of 10?
BERNARD TOMIC: I think honestly, if I can say there are 50 people fitter than me outside of the top 70 to 150 in the world. There are some players not as fit as me inside the top 10, 15 in the world.

Will fitness help them? I don't think so. I feel obviously the big servers, Isner, Raonic, Kyrgios, Karlovic are there. I don't think fitness can help them. Fitness has got me... I've based my sport, what I've got in my career, with my serve, my ability to play tennis.

I think there are many fitter players than me that are outside the top 100 in the world. I think we can skip this question.

Q. Has your weight stabilized?
BERNARD TOMIC: I'm not going to answer that.

Q. How would you describe your sort of hunger or desperation for bigger and better things this year, at this tournament, and in 2017 generally? How high of goals do you set for yourself, what is success, what is failure?
BERNARD TOMIC: Well, top 10 is my goal. Top 20, because my goal two years ago, a year and a half ago. I achieved that from being 130 in the world prior to two surgeries from that. Now my goal is to get to top 10 and stay there many years. You have to work for this. It's not going to happen overnight.

I think my year last year was pretty solid. I didn't play many tournaments. I think I pulled out of two Masters Series. I think I only play two Masters Series out of the nine. My ranking ended 26 at the end of the year, from a start of 17, 18. I think I did reasonably well last year compared to the tournaments I missed.

Yeah, this year I have to play all the Masters Series and try to do well at them. I'm looking forward to this year.

Q. Are there big steps between you and the top 10 or are you already doing everything right?
BERNARD TOMIC: Well, I think there are a lot of good players in the top 20, top 30 that are top-10 players. You got to get there. You got to earn it. Whether it comes like that or in four, five years, you know, you obviously are going to get your chance. If you're consistent, you work hard, do the right things, you have a big chance at this.

There are, like I said, many, many players from top 20, 30 in the world that are amazing tennis players, potentially play better than some of the guys in the top 10. But it's a different game. You have to be more consistent, you have to work for this. It takes a year. It doesn't take three tournaments.

Q. You've been pretty consistent here throughout the years. Is that because it's at home, the time of year? How do you explain that?
BERNARD TOMIC: Well, I think this is my ninth Australian Open. I'm 24, just turned. This is my ninth Australian Open. It's crazy to think how long it's been. I obviously played my first match year at 16, where I think I won the youngest match. It's gone pretty quickly. I always played well. Always made a lot of third rounds, fourth rounds. I'd like to go a step further, play better.

But, yeah, it's obviously a tough draw. It's going to be tough. I think I've got to use the moment, use the crowd. Obviously the fans get behind me, I'm sure they will. They always get behind our Australian players and support them to their limits. I think that's what makes us play really good in Australia.

Q. When you say you're not looking at the wins and losses, other people are saying it's not great preparation. What make you more confident, what makes you shrug this off?
BERNARD TOMIC: Well, yeah, I think I chose to play a few different events as opposed to playing Sydney like I played in the past four, five years. So I feel like, yeah, Brisbane I lost to a former world No. 3. It was a tough match. I take a lot from it. I went down to Sydney, played the exhibition. Same as Kooyong. Different sort of matches, I was working on a few things. I don't really rate these matches as winning or losing, Sydney and Kooyong. That's not important to me. What's important for me is to get out on the court, do my thing and work on a few things I needed to do. And just to be ready mentally for the Open. I played very good in my past here where I haven't been prepared for tournaments. Sometimes it happens just like that. Sometimes I prepared well and not been as ready.

But that's tennis. Players work hard, try their ass off, sometimes you lose. Sometimes you're less prepared, and you do well.

Q. You're looking forward to the fans getting behind you? To 10,000 Aussies. Be put out on Hisense?
BERNARD TOMIC: I think Hisense is an amazing court. It's huge. The atmosphere builds there. Everybody is behind everybody. It's a good court.

Regardless of where I play, I think I'm going to have huge support. It's an amazing feeling to see people supporting in a Grand Slam the Australian players. It's very motivating. I hope the fans can all support us.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297