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DAVIS CUP FIRST ROUND

February 11, 2006

Horia Tecau

LA JOLLA, CALIFORNIA

THE MODERATOR: First question, please.
Q. Victor, can you talk about how this happened. Is it something that just happened? Can you talk about how you felt.
VICTOR HANESCU: I felt something after the serve, right after the serve. I felt pain here on the left side, a very sharp and strong pain. At the beginning, I thought it's something easier, but after the second serve I understand that it's something really bad because it was very painful.
That's it. I mean, I couldn't play anymore.
Q. And what is the situation for tomorrow? Do you think you will try to play, or not? What did the doctor tell you?
VICTOR HANESCU: I don't know yet for the -- I don't know yet because the doctor didn't tell me too many things. I have maybe to go now to the hospital, MRI to make. And we'll see tomorrow after some rest. I don't know.
Q. You had this occur before?
VICTOR HANESCU: No, I never had this before, so it's first time that I have something like this.
Q. Did the doctor say it was a crack or break or sprain?
CAPTAIN FLORIN SEGARCEANU: Intercostal strained muscle. Something like that. We are going to check it out.
Q. It's not necessarily a rib injury?
CAPTAIN FLORIN SEGARCEANU: Right, a muscle injury.
Q. Are you expecting him to play tomorrow?
CAPTAIN FLORIN SEGARCEANU: It's hard to say. In this moment, not. But we have to see after MRI, and we have to see how he feels tomorrow morning, how he wakes up. In this moment, the way he looks, probably not too many chance to play. We'll see how it's gonna go.
Q. What are you thinking?
CAPTAIN FLORIN SEGARCEANU: In this moment, I'm hoping, I'm praying that he gets better tomorrow. So in this moment, nothing else I'm thinking. We gonna make a decision tonight or tomorrow morning when he wakes up and tries to play a little bit.
Q. Victor, it wasn't just the serve. After your forehand, that big forehand when you went to the other side, that hurt it, too?
VICTOR HANESCU: Yeah.
Q. Even when you turned.
VICTOR HANESCU: At first I thought it's only -- I have the pain only when I serve. But then when we change the side and I played that forehand, I felt the same pain, so it was impossible to continue.
Q. So if you have to substitute tomorrow, who will you choose as your player?
CAPTAIN FLORIN SEGARCEANU: Well, we have two possibilities. We have either Razvan Sabau who is a more experienced player and better ranking, or a newcomer, Horia-Vlad Tecau. He has a good game for hard court. He has a big serve, good volley. We have to think about this. We gonna sleep over it and we gonna make a decision tomorrow morning.
We are sorry. In my point of view, we are very sorry we have to stop the match, but it was not worth trying this. I mean, you know, after the break, after he lost his serve, the doctor was there and we knew that is not something easy. The pain was coming even after hitting the forehand. When he turns around the body, you know, the pain comes.
So we are very sorry that to stop this match because normally we try to play until the end, but was not worth it. He could probably injure himself worse every point he was playing, so we had to stop.
Q. What led you to the decision to keep Victor on and take Andrei out of the mix today?
CAPTAIN FLORIN SEGARCEANU: Well, it was first because Andrei had a tough match. And then, you know, he also felt today a little bit tired after that match, you know. He is 32 years old. We have to take in consideration this.
And then we also thought that, you know, Victor didn't have a tough match yesterday, was quite quick, less than two hours. So we thought, you know, he wanted to play this doubles, so we thought keeping him in the court would do something better for him. Still playing, still get used to this atmosphere, the light, the sun and everything. So would be a good practice for the third day. That's why we thought this could be a good solution.
Q. Victor, how are you feeling right now, just sitting down at the table?
VICTOR HANESCU: Feeling bad, of course. First of all, because of the match, because we couldn't finish this game, and also because of my pain. So I am not feeling very good in this moment.
Q. Victor, before the injury occurred, did you feel like you and Horia were holding your own against the Bryans? Did you feel you were into the match?
VICTOR HANESCU: We were in, I don't know, let's say in good moment. I mean, we start to play better and better, because close end of the set. I don't know if we had many chances to win this match, but I think it was a good chance to make a good one.
Q. Horia, Romania probably didn't have all that great a chance of winning the match even if Victor had remained in the match. You're playing the No. 1 doubles team in the world, winners of the Australian Open. Did that enter into your thinking? You seemed like you were moving as strongly as you could?
HORIA-VLAD TECAU: Well, there are many things you have to take in consideration, you know. First of all, in Davis Cup, you never think that you have no chance. Probably when the Bryans played Croatia, they probably ask something similar, you know.
But in Davis Cup, everything can happen, you know. You saw yesterday, things can turn around. Of course we knew the Bryans have the first chance; they are No. 1 team in the world and they won the Australian Open, they had so much experience.
But we took in consideration what other possibilities we have. We have no other couple that played too many matches, you know. Andrei and Victor, they played few matches. They played in Australian Open, they lost against the Bryans in the first round. And also we have to think about Andrei, you know, because he was tired after the match. That's why we thought we gonna do this move. I don't know if was good or bad. In this moment, nothing worked out, you know. Victor got injured. I really don't know what would happen to have a different team in this moment.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you.

End of FastScripts...

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