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CITI OPEN

August 4, 2019

Washington D.C.

KLAASEN-VENUS/Rojer-Tecau

3-6, 6-3, 10-2

THE MODERATOR: Questions, please.

Q. Congratulations on your victory today. This season now you have won titles on grass at Halle, you were a semifinalist at Wimbledon, a finalist on clay, and now you've won a title on hard court. Sounds like you're pretty consistent on all surfaces, but do you have a favorite one of the three?
MICHAEL VENUS: That's a good question. I'm not really sure how to --

RAVEN KLAASEN: I mean, I think hard is probably our best. My favorite is grass. That might only be because it's such a short season that you don't get to play much, so that might be why it's my favorite.

But I think we both come from hard court backgrounds, so that's probably where we're the most comfortable.

Q. So the first two sets were pretty even, pretty balanced, and then you guys took off in the match tiebreak. So I'm just curious what you think made the difference there and how much of it was momentum and how much of it was other stuff you guys were doing?
MICHAEL VENUS: Yeah, I think Rave took off there and I was trying to hang on to his coattails through that tiebreaker.

Yeah, I mean, throughout the match, they were serving really well. We were really -- we had a couple looks early on on their service games. But other than that, we weren't really getting much into their services games. And when we did make returns, they were just putting the volleys away.

So we just said, you know, we just have to kind of back ourselves and try and be aggressive and hopefully something comes of it. And at 4-3, we both made some great returns that game and that gave us some confidence. And then I think Rave's confidence just continued to go up after each time he touched the ball after that.

Q. Michael, there was a very scary moment there in the second set where inadvertently through the back and forth you hit Horia with a forehand smash. Does this happen often in doubles? And at this point of the match, how did you and Raven cope with what happened? And it seemed like a little bit of a turning point of the match.
MICHAEL VENUS: Yeah, I mean, I think it happens a lot more than maybe people realize. I think I'm fortunate where it kind of hit him.

I think lately there's actually been a few of them. It happened to Rave at Wimbledon. He got hit in the head also. And Mahut in the finals at Wimbledon got hit quite a few times.

There's been a few lately where it has kind of gone in an area which is dangerous and scary for everyone. So, first off, glad that he's okay and was up and fine after that.

And, yeah, I guess it's just part of one of those things. When we're all at the net, you're just reacting and sometimes you don't have time to make adjustments and balls just come in fast.

So, yeah, it's unfortunate. Yeah, I feel bad where I hit him and that.

Q. Has it ever happened to you?
MICHAEL VENUS: I've been hit plenty of times, yeah. So, I mean, thankfully I haven't been hit in the eye. And I'm sure, you know, that's probably the one spot which is, you know, the most dangerous.

RAVEN KLAASEN: I can think of one more.

MICHAEL VENUS: Huh?

RAVEN KLAASEN: I can think of one more spot that would be dangerous. (Laughing.)

MICHAEL VENUS: Yeah, that's true.

RAVEN KLAASEN: Actually, talking about that, I had a good view from behind that. And it's weird because I hit the return and then I saw Mike's position. And my first thing was like, Man, Horia, get out of there. It's a dangerous place you're in.

When you're that close to each other and the ball goes up, the chance of you winning that point goes down dramatically, but the chance of you getting tagged goes up dramatically.

So scary moment from the back, seeing that, but we've been on the receiving end of that plenty of times. And with how doubles is played these days, trying to dominate the net, I think we are putting ourselves in positions that probably lead to more guys being tagged than before.

Q. Which tournament are you guys going to be playing next?
MICHAEL VENUS: We were supposed to play Montreal next week, but Raven couldn't get a visa.

RAVEN KLAASEN: Yeah, I wasn't granted a Canadian visa in time. So my passport is a little bit tougher to travel on than Mike's. So he's going to go play next week with someone else, and I'll be taking a training week to go to Cinci, and we'll join up there again.

Q. Are you planning to play together soon after that?
MICHAEL VENUS: Yeah, the following week after that Cincinnati and then the US Open.

RAVEN KLAASEN: Yeah, Cincinnati and then the US Open.

Q. I just wanted to ask you about this week in general and sort of first of all, the strength of the doubles draw. I mean, I've been here for years. You guys have been here before. It's always a good draw, but this year in particular it was good and a lot of great teams. The Bryans, the Murray brothers weren't even seeded. So I'm curious, first of all, to ask about this week and kind of how you feel about the whole performance. And then also how this week kind of fits into the whole hard court North American stretch and how it will maybe propel you into the rest of the season.
RAVEN KLAASEN: Yeah, I will say when the draw first came out, everybody was looking at that like, Man, there's no easy way out through this thing. You had to be ready from day one.

And for us, every day felt like a final, pretty much. We snuck through a couple of match tiebreakers this week. But if you look at the first round, I think there was only one match that didn't go to a match tiebreaker.

So with these size draws and this level of play, you know that every match is going to be tough. And if you had asked me what are the chance of us sitting here today at the beginning of the week, it would have been a stretch to imagine given the strength of the field.

But we played well enough to give ourselves a chance and we capitalized on those.

Q. You all have come a long way. I noticed looking through my notes that you go all the way back to 2011 in a Future tournament in Uzbekistan, and here you are now one of the top ranked teams in the world.
MICHAEL VENUS: Great research there.

Q. What would you say contributes to your success? What makes the two of you a good doubles team? How do you complement each other's skills?
MICHAEL VENUS: Uzbekistan, that seems like a long time ago we played in that Future.

RAVEN KLAASEN: That was certainly different than this, I'll be honest, yeah. Because at that stage we --

MICHAEL VENUS: I don't even know what we --

RAVEN KLAASEN: Yeah, we were lost. That's a good way. And we were playing sort of -- both of us were in the singles draw. We just happened to come across each other this. This time, we ended up speaking before we started playing and we thought we might combine well, and it was more of a professional coming together. Whereas the first time was, Hey, you want to play? Let's do it.

Q. (Off microphone.)
MICHAEL VENUS: Yeah, that's when we first -- I spoke about playing together. Rave's very athletic. Has great hands around the net. Moves very well. And then that kind of frees me up and allows me to be aggressive and hit hard. So we thought it would kind of match up, but sometimes it takes time to figure things out and get used to each other and that.

And I think probably the best thing is kind of our communication and ability to keep working together and staying on the page and working towards the same goal together. And that's kind of helped us keep evolving and keep getting better.

Q. So I just wanted to ask again kind of like this tournament marks kind of a turning point in the season because it's most players' first hard court tournament after the grass and so how does it go forward? And then one silly question for Michael at the end.
RAVEN KLAASEN: I mean, this tournament is an important spot for us because it's usually where we, given our position in the dubs, start our season in the hard courts.

And you have about three chances to play before you get to the end of the hard court season in North America and you -- we've had about two weeks off right before we came here, so we put a big emphasis on starting the season off right.

Because whatever confidence and momentum you can gain this first week, really, you can use that the rest of the way through and hopefully have a strong North American swing.

But, yeah, D.C. has been great. We made semifinals here last year. It's important week for us, and hopefully we can keep having sustained success out there.

Q. Michael, so my question is about your clothing sponsor. I don't know how long you've been with Hydrogen, but I was in Rome this year. It's maybe the only stop on the tour that as a Hydrogen tent. So I'm curious what is it about the brand that kind of attracted you? And their vibe is kind of different than a lot of other traditional tennis brands. So is it just they gave you the money or is it more than that?
MICHAEL VENUS: No, I mean, the quality of the stuff is -- it's a lot different than some of the other stuff. But, yeah, the quality is unbelievable. And I kind of like the skull. They're kind of out there. They're a little bit different. So it appealed to me. And I had the opportunity to wear their stuff, so jumped at it.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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CITI OPEN

August 4, 2019

Raven Klaasen

Michael Venus