QATAR TOTAL ENERGIES OPEN

February 26, 2022

Iga Swiatek

Press Conference from Recording

I. SWIATEK/A. Kontaveit

6-2, 6-0

Q. Congratulations. A great week for you and a great performance. Just talk us through firstly your thoughts on the match and how you came out playing today.

IGA SWIATEK: Well, first of all, I'm pretty happy that I was composed and I stayed in the same shape I was for the whole tournament, because playing finals is a different feeling. It's always a little bit more stress.

I knew that Anett is going to play well, because she's shown consistency throughout the whole six months, I would say. Yeah, I needed to put pressure on her, and I'm pretty happy that I did that well today.

Q. Were you at all I guess a little bit surprised at how well you came out in that first set and just how dominant you were?

IGA SWIATEK: Truth be told, I always played such tough matches against Anett that I was -- yeah, I mean, I was kind of surprised. On one hand, I knew that I'm doing a great job and I was, you know, in the right mood and I was putting pressure and I was dominating, but on the other hand, it's not what I was used to playing against her.

I just wanted to continue that, and I put like all my strength to, yeah, to basically doing like the same things I did in the first set, because it's not easy sometimes to have that kind of mindset throughout the whole match. Because sometimes you have many moments where you can lose focus or think about some other stuff or have doubts, but I didn't want to have that today. So I was just, you know, staying focused.

Q. You have had a lot of crowd support throughout the week, a lot of Polish fans at all of your matches. Just how much energy have you been getting from them? And especially tonight, how much energy did you get from the crowd?

IGA SWIATEK: Well, for sure I can see that to every place I go there are many Polish people, which is always surprising. You know, it's not like I'm really used to that, because still, having so much fans, it's a pretty new thing for me. I'm learning how to use it in the best way.

But for sure this tournament has shown that during these night sessions and during the times when I need to get some energy from the crowd, I'm doing it the right way.

Also, there are times where I need to just focus on myself and on the tasks and on the game, which is sometimes hard to do, but this tournament, I mean, I did that pretty well and it was kind of easy to turn that off if I needed.

Q. Just a couple of thoughts on how things are going with Tomasz, obviously you started in the offseason and you have had a couple of really successful tournaments to start the year. Talk us through how that's going and how you feel the relationship is going so far.

IGA SWIATEK: Well, I really love that he's kind of -- he convinced me to change my approach towards my tennis. I am being more aggressive right now and I love that. At first I wasn't really convinced, so yeah, I mean, big thanks to him for showing me this different perspective.

Practicing in Warsaw is a totally different story than going on tour, so I'm pretty happy the last few weeks have shown that we have a good relationship, and we have also like good mood in our team. We have fun. And it was always important for me to other members of the team to have a good relationship between each other, so I can have like full support but also feel comfortable around them. They are giving me a lot.

So Tomasz, I mean, that's a joke, but he kind of passed all my tests. Yeah, I think we are going to continue doing the job we are doing right now.

Q. How happy are you with your, I guess, consistency but also backing up your semifinal run in Australia to then coming to February and win a 1000 tournament?

IGA SWIATEK: Well, for me, it's kind of overwhelming because I didn't expect to have such a great level of tennis week by week on hard court.

I always considered myself, as people actually told, a clay court player. I was improving on hard court, but for sure this season my progress is faster. It's so nice to have these kind of matches where you don't have actually problems with, you know, keeping the pace and with staying aggressive, because right now I'm the more aggressive player, and I really love it, because it's giving me a lot of confidence on and off court. It's just making sometimes life on court easier.

Q. Looking ahead, immediate plans, obviously to go home and just thinking ahead to Indian Wells in a couple weeks' time?

IGA SWIATEK: For sure right now I'm going to need some time to rest, so I'm going to take a few days off. Wait, what was the question?

Q. Your thoughts on approaching Indian Wells and having some rest at home the next couple of weeks.

IGA SWIATEK: I didn't really think about that, because even though we are going to travel there in a few days basically, it seems so far away, I want to celebrate right now the victory, and we are gonna see how the preparation is going to go in Indian Wells. We are going to go there a little bit earlier to practice in the same condition as the tournament is.

But for now at home I want to chill out a little bit, have a few days off, so I'll be back to work when I need to (smiling).