AUSTRALIAN OPEN

January 22, 2022

Danielle Collins

Press Conference

D. COLLINS/C. Tauson

4-6, 6-4, 7-5

Q. Congratulations. You're in the fourth round. How do you feel after your match today?

DANIELLE COLLINS: Good. I just finished singles and doubles so a bit of a marathon day, but always good to come out on top, especially when you're playing singles and doubles back-to-back. Yeah, really happy with how I played, and the physicality of everything and feeling good, so yeah.

Q. For singles especially, what was the key to edging her out because it was very tight?

DANIELLE COLLINS: Yeah, I had to make some technical adjustments just with the conditions. I think sometimes at noon you throw up the ball and the sun is right in your eyes. Kind of just needed to make a little bit of an adjustment there in the second set that I probably should have made a little earlier but I didn't.

Yeah, had to bring in the court a little bit because I lost my rhythm for a while and was making a few too many errors. Had to run down a lot of balls and be willing to play some longer points in certain moments. Yeah, just a couple of minor adjustments but really made a big difference I think in the end.

Q. Your last match point that you won, I don't know if you thought that return went in or not because it was sort of a delayed reaction from both of you. Can you describe what was happening there?

DANIELLE COLLINS: Yeah, I think we were both playing so close to the lines on some of the points. I wasn't really sure if it was in or out, so I was happy once the call was made that it was in. It just took a second to kind of realize that I won the match.

Q. What does it mean to you to make a second week here to start your year?

DANIELLE COLLINS: Yeah, it means a lot. I think I had a great year last year and then it was great to have a little bit of break over the preseason and take some time off and kind of let the body rest and then kind of get back to it right away. Really only a couple weeks off.

Just trying to carry everything that I learned last year going into this year, and yeah, then getting used to being in tournament mode again.

Q. I'm working on a story on Alizé Cornet who's going for a record this year of most consecutive Grand Slam appearances. She's already over 60. I just wanted somebody who knows the grind of this tour, what you make of that sort of streak and what you think it would take to have that kind of consistency of being able to post up for each of these events?

DANIELLE COLLINS: Yeah, I think it really speaks to her level of fitness and physicality and all the work over the years. She's been on tour for a while, so it's an incredible achievement, playing as a professional to be able to do that.

Q. With respect to making the adjustments and doing what you needed to do to get that win today, how pleased are you that that aspect of your game has clicked in so quickly to start the year in terms of having the confidence to make the adjustments and then just really battling it out through the end there against really an opponent that was playing incredibly well?

DANIELLE COLLINS: Yeah, I think the first couple matches into a tournament, especially without playing warm-up events, it's a little bit of trial and error. I certainly gave myself a run for my money today, and especially with how Clara was playing. It's never ideal to be down a set and 4-2, but it was kind of like I either needed to make the adjustments or I was going to lose the match. So I had to make that adjustment pretty quickly and really commit to it.

I think a little bit of luck got involved, as well. So that helped.

Q. Everybody needs a little bit of luck, but you mentioned the learnings from last season, taking them into this season. What specifically do you mean by that? What were the big takeaways from last year?

DANIELLE COLLINS: Yeah, I think last year winning my first two events, I think it taught me how to win matches when I wasn't playing as well and not playing perfect tennis because I think it's easy to go into a tournament and make quarterfinals or semifinals. Not easy, but you know what I mean; you can win a couple of matches, but to win a tournament you really have to kind of embrace all of the different circumstances. You're going to have windy days, you're going to have rain delays, you're going to have times where you're missing and not playing your best, and then you're going to have times where you probably are playing your best, so being able to ride out the highs and lows.

I think I made a big improvement and step in the right direction last year with that, just trying to figure out solutions. I certainly added a lot of variety to my game and kind of developing more skills to be able to hopefully have deeper runs in tournaments, so we'll see. Fingers crossed.

Q. Looking ahead to facing Elise Mertens in the round of 16, can you talk about the challenges of playing here? I'm guessing it's a little bit of a different matchup than what you had to face today.

DANIELLE COLLINS: Yeah, she's had some really great results in Australia. I think she made semis the year before and has always been a really solid player, a high-ranked player on tour. She's very consistent across the board and is always fighting until the end. I'm sure we're going to really battle out there and hopefully have fun at the same time.