TMS MONTE CARLO

April 21, 2000

Karim Alami

Q. You did something really good today?

KARIM ALAMI: I am very pleased that I have reached that stage but I still didn't achieve my objectives for this year. It is a great victory but I have to remain concentrated for the next match. Competition starts really today. The quarterfinals mean a better tennis. If I win tomorrow, I will be closer to my objectives.

KARIM ALAMI: It is pleasing. I beat him last year on clay. In Barcelona I played well. I knew it was going to be a very difficult match. The balls here are very fast. He was playing well then and I was playing well. I knew it was going to be a very difficult match. I was ready. I was well prepared mentally. I was very pumped up as I said, I have an objective and this year I want to achieve it. If it is not this week, I still hope it will be the following week.

KARIM ALAMI: To win a Super 9, a Master Series. For sure it is a good victory and I am happy but I have to remain lucid and concentrated. As soon as we start to be satisfied we don't go further. So you have to keep concentrating on the next day.

KARIM ALAMI: Since a week. We played Davis Cup in Casablanca and then this week.

KARIM ALAMI: I improved my backhand a lot. Without that work I would never have been able to reach that level. I am counterattacking a lot better. Players are not able to make pressure on my on my backhand. I send it back higher from the baseline. They can't pressure me on my backhand. Before. I was using a chop shot often, but in the end I was three meters away from the ball. So now it is a great step forward I improved.

KARIM ALAMI: Technically speaking and all the rest. Before I was playing my shots but as soon as I was playing a solid player, it didn't go well. The backhand wasn't succeeding. I was too weak a shot. I am able to sustain the rally longer now to remain on the baseline even against a player like Costa or Corretja.

KARIM ALAMI: Three months.

KARIM ALAMI: Yes, in my life and in my mind it changed a lot. It is great to be a father. It is the most beautiful thing that ever happened to me in my life. I am very pleased. I think about him very often. I don't have the same vision of life. It is him and many things orientated towards him. It is fabulous.

KARIM ALAMI: I am one of the older guys on the Tour. When I see Ferrero born in 1982 it makes me think.

KARIM ALAMI: It is the people saying that. That is the way my game is. I go up to the net. It is an attacking game. I am not going to stay on the baseline hitting like a Spanish player. Forehand, backhand, forehand, backhand, I am not -- I have no pleasure playing like that. I like to do dropshots, serve and volley, I have fun on the court that way. If it is a show, it is all the better. I am pleasing myself on the court.

KARIM ALAMI: Well, all the better.

KARIM ALAMI: Before it was Carlos Gattiker, an Argentinian. We had problems. He was never sick before but since last July he is very sick.

KARIM ALAMI: I am still with my same physical preparator, he is also a physiotherapist. His name is Francois Riber. He is travelling with me since two years.

KARIM ALAMI: I speak six languages, French, Arabic, Spanish, English, Portuguese and Italian.

KARIM ALAMI: Almost.

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