	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

DAVIS CUP FINALS

November 21, 2019

Jan-Lennard Struff

Paris, France

GERMANY 1, Chile 1

GARIN/Struff 6-7, 7-6, 7-6

THE MODERATOR: We will start with some questions in English, please, and then we will move to national language. First question?

Q. Obviously that was a huge battle, match points for both of you. How did you feel about today and what made the difference in the end?
JAN-LENNARD STRUFF: Yeah, it was amazing match, I would say. Cristian was fighting like hell. And yeah, atmosphere was great. The Chilean fans were supporting him really, really good. My team were supporting me very good.

I think it was just, yeah, a really good fight and good match. And in that match it was like one or two points made the difference. But, yeah, I had chances to break him in the second, I didn't convert them. But yeah, it was really good match, I would say.

Q. Obviously Germany are through. I'm wondering how do you feel about how the team has done in the group stages and how confident do you guys feel of making it further than the quarterfinals?
JAN-LENNARD STRUFF: I'm very happy that we went through. We secured it with four matches in a row. It's amazing. I didn't expect that before getting in here, and I'm very pleased and happy about that. And now, yeah, we see on the TV they're going to play our next opponent.

I think we are a good team, we play all very good, we have a good team spirit. I think, yeah, we can beat whoever wins next round. We are very confident. And yeah, we hope the journey will still continue here.

Q. From my point of view, also for your sportsmanship because you stayed on court a lot of time. And to my understanding, once Kohlschreiber won his match, Germany was already assured to be first in this group. Considering what happened with Belgium, for example, with the doubles between Belgium and Australia or between Canada and the United States, what are your thinking, your perspective, if your team decide to play anyway or what? Just your impression.
JAN-LENNARD STRUFF: Sure. It's a hard program, we play day by day by day. And yeah, sure, our thoughts like, okay, it's a very long match and is it good to play a very long match like two-and-a-half hours before playing tomorrow when it counts again? I mean, this match counts and I want to perform for my country, and I gave everything to win the match, 100 percent today.

But we had no -- like it's just thoughts, just thoughts, you have these thoughts. But it was 100 percent clear that we going to going to play the match, 100 percent clear, 100 percent clear we play the doubles, there was no doubt.

Yesterday, with the Australian team against Belgium, okay, that was a bit different because Australia qualified, I think they play today again. It was already late and the Belgian team couldn't get second spot for the qualifying so that's a different story as well.

Q. You are likely to play Great Britain in the next round in the quarters. How would you assess their team in terms of singles and doubles, the matchups? What's your opinion prior to this great match?
JAN-LENNARD STRUFF: Yeah, it's not sure yet who going to win because it's 1-All. Great Britain are leading 3-1. So if we play them, they have good players. Edmund was beating Kukushkin today 3 and 3, which is a good result. He was playing in Paris, played very good, beat Schwartzman there. And Evans, yeah, lost to Bublik today but was serving for the match yesterday against Haase. He's a very good player. He beat me in Wimbledon.

I think, yeah -- I know Andy Murray, they have, like, I think he might -- I think he will play tomorrow, if they win. They have a strong doubles team as well.

Kazakhstan is, like, also a good team. Like, Kukushkin beat me at Wimbledon this year, a good match. Bublik, you never know what's going to happen, he's such a good, talented player.

Whoever is there, whoever comes to play against us, we try to beat them.

Q. Can you describe the type of pressure that this kind of round-robin format was like for you stepping on the court as second for singles and just playing back-to-back and all of that. How does the pressure compare to other times that you've played Davis Cup or something else?
JAN-LENNARD STRUFF: You mean pressure?

Q. Yeah. Just the pressure of this type of format, the back-to-back...
JAN-LENNARD STRUFF: Okay. Yeah, I mean, I played in Davis Cup and won tie all three days in a row, and it's pretty tough and pretty hard.

But I mean, it's not best-of-five here anymore. It was back-to-back, three days, best-of-five. So that was really, really exhausting.

But a match like this today, and an intense match like against Schwartzman yesterday, yeah, it's not easy to handle. But we have good physios in our team, which I will work soon with after the press conference. And we try to do everything that everybody is feeling fresh tomorrow and give 100 percent again.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you very much. We will carry on in German.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297