US OPEN

September 8, 1999

Monica Seles

WTA: Questions for Monica.

MONICA SELES: I lost the second set. I was probably frustrated with what happened in the second set, after coming back from 4-Love. I think probably Serena raised her level in the third set and I dropped quite a few levels. I wasn't getting up to the ball as much and moving as well as I did in the first set.

MONICA SELES: I don't know. I mean, there are probably a couple of factors that lead up to it. You know, there are no excuses. She's just the better player today.

MONICA SELES: That's hard to say because the last time I played Serena was the Lipton. It was a much more one-sided match at that point. She's definitely playing some great tennis. I mean, obviously she had a fantastic summer at the LA tournament and getting to the semis is great. I mean, I think both semifinal matches should be really terrific.

MONICA SELES: They're obviously very good players. They're physically very strong. They both have great serves. Serena was serving a lot of 115s there. Not a lot of girls can serve like that. They're playing very well. Put them up with Lindsay and Hingis who are playing some really good tennis right now.

MONICA SELES: I do sometimes, yeah. There were a couple times I looked because she was just really serving so well down the T.

MONICA SELES: I don't know. We'll just have to see. I don't know.

MONICA SELES: Yeah, definitely. We saw that today with Mary. She was unlucky against Lindsay a little bit there. But that's just great. I mean, probably I'd say the top four girls right now (inaudible) bit above. Even if it's a tight match, they'll win it. But there are probably four or five girls that could beat them or upset them, however you phrase it, on any given day. That can change obviously in the future.

MONICA SELES: Did she announce retirement? I had no idea.

MONICA SELES: I don't know. I mean, when I come into the locker room, I have my group of people, my friends. That hasn't changed over the years. I just had a friend of mine retire. I was more kind of sad about that one. No. I mean, no.

MONICA SELES: She's physically a lot stronger than I am and gets back a lot more balls than I do, and her reach is much better.

MONICA SELES: Not so much. That really I don't think was the case today, in that specific time. It was something else. But, no, huh-uh.

MONICA SELES: I still do that. You guys just don't ask me about it (laughter). It's normal. When you're a youngster, everybody writes about you. My time was there. Now it's Venus and Serena and Martina's time. It's just normal. Five years from now, they'll have to deal with the other ones. There are going to be younger ones whose time will be at that point. My life really hasn't changed in terms of that. In terms of tennis, it's definitely a lot tougher, but I've still been hanging in there, in the Top 5. If I want to move up, I sure have to make some adjustments. You know, that will be up to me.

MONICA SELES: I go to Japan the same night from Fed Cup, and I play six weeks in a row. It's kind of a hard one because I missed three tournaments, hurting my ranking. You definitely have to do that, there's no question. I know that. I just have to see if I want to do it or not.

MONICA SELES: I think it's obvious. I have my strokes and everything is there, it's just physically I can't cover the court as well.

MONICA SELES: I personally never had the desire to be No. 1. I never woke up my whole life in the morning thinking, "I want to be No. 1." It was really that I love to play tennis. Maybe as a child, everything comes differently, I don't know. Then once you win a Grand Slam, you realize how good it feels, then you want to win more Grand Slams. If I would speak of a desire, that would be it. But it's not like a daily desire or anything like that.

MONICA SELES: I have my own battles with that. I have to figure that out in my own brain. Hopefully I'll do that. I think you have to overcome different things in your life. You know, I've overcome certain things and certain things I haven't, so.

MONICA SELES: I don't think about it. I mean, being No. 4 in the world, I'm pretty happy (laughter). The world is pretty big. Maybe if I would be ranked something, I don't know. But being No. 4, I don't really think about that right now, not at all.

MONICA SELES: Being on the Tour committee, yeah, for sure. You know, hopefully it won't be a running joke.

MONICA SELES: We just had some meetings here. I don't know. I mean -- I don't know. I'll just leave it at that.

MONICA SELES: I really don't know because the players on that committee, I represent the top players, the news we get is really not in details. We just know yes or no. We're all hopeful. I think it's a tough one I guess for different reasons, but also I feel it shouldn't be as tough as it is right now.

MONICA SELES: You can't compare. I have a lot of friends who don't even know what tennis is, and they're now watching women's tennis or reading about it. The only really person right now in men's tennis, if you ask someone outside, they know Andre really because of how well he's done. No question, I mean, women's tennis at every tournament literally - except maybe the French, but that was on par because Steffi also won with Andre - women have gotten more coverage, better matches. The men's tournament you almost kind of know who is going to win, which maybe women's tournaments were ten years ago. We all complained about that. Right now, you look at the US Open semifinals, and the finals, it's just a terrific product out there.

MONICA SELES: We haven't been told that. That's a good question, why we can't find them. The reason they tell us on the committee is they're trying, and they haven't been successful are the exact words.

MONICA SELES: I do know one of them, what was presented to us, was I guess tennis is a worldwide product, and some parts of their company didn't want to get involved in women's tennis. Another one was that they have to spend, I don't know how much, but a lot on advertisement, and they didn't want to do that commitment. But we never really get very specific reports.

MONICA SELES: Last I know, it was IMG, then it went to the WTA. I don't know. I know IMG has been trying very hard. Again, I know they allowed -- not allowed, but WTA also owned their own from what I heard from our CEO, Bart, that we're doing the search on our own, too. It's September, and hopefully we'll have somebody.

MONICA SELES: Oh, definitely. I mean, the same thing five years ago when I returned on the Tour about Lindsay. You would feel in a few years' time she would be a top player. As a player, when you play somebody, you kind of sense that. Definitely Serena and Venus are up there. I mean, they have such an advantage to have each other just in terms of company, practice, pushing each other, that I don't think it can get better than that.

MONICA SELES: I enjoy it very much in Ancona. I'm very happy about the site. Obviously when we played Fed Cup matches in the States, the attendance has been really poor. I think with the lineup we have now and at Stanford, it's going to be full. Personally it's embarrassing when you go to Spain and there's 7,000 people cheering against you. You come to the States in the finals and there are 500 people there. It just makes you feel really weird. I'm very happy we'll finally have a full stadium.

MONICA SELES: Whatever happens, it's so hard, it's different. Spanish, they celebrate things very differently than Americans. We all I think are going to Japan, except I think Serena is going to Luxembourg. We really can't stay out too late. It would be really nice. We all made a promise to Billie that we would like to bring back the Fed Cup, especially with what happened with the men's Davis Cup. It's just a terrific chance for us.