TMS - INDIAN WELLS

March 18, 2000

Alex Corretja

GREG SHARKO: Alex moves into his fifth career Tennis Masters Series final and he'll try to win his second Tennis Masters Series title. Second straight year a Spaniard has reached the final here at Indian Wells. He'll try to become the first Spaniard to win here in the desert since Jose Higueras in 1983.

ALEX CORRETJA: Boy, I practice hard. I don't practice that kind of match point especially. But if I wouldn't be with that much energy at the end of the match, I could not reach, especially the forehand, down the line, then the backhand one. It was amazing point. I mean, it was pretty long, long rallies after almost, I don't know how long, 1 hour, 40 minutes. I don't know how I even hit that backhand. I thought I closed my eyes or something. I thought it was over when I hit my forehand. All of a sudden he just show his racquet and put the ball in the other part of the court. I was kind of, "I've got to run again? Come on." I just hit it. I thought he was going able to catch the ball. Fortunately, he didn't get it. It was a good final.

ALEX CORRETJA: It's difficult to say that. When you are in a semifinals of a tournament like Indian Wells, in a Masters Series, it's a pretty nice sensation.

ALEX CORRETJA: Well, there is not a transformation from January to March. The transformation, it cames from November last year where I rest, I had some time off, then I start to practice again. When I came back to Australia, I was in a pretty good shape. I play pretty well the first tournament. But my game wasn't that good. I was winning matches, but I didn't feel that much confidence. It had been a while for me that I didn't play well. So after that defeat, as I said these days, I thought it was in a good way. Unfortunately for me, it was like a shock. But I just decided to forget about it, don't think about it, try to go for my shots, try to go for my practice, continue, keep on going. For sure if they would tell me in six weeks I would be in this final, I would say, "Come on, you're joking." I didn't think so far. I just day-by-day. Afterwards, it work pretty well. I recover myself pretty well. After 15 days we play Davis Cup in Spain, I won my singles and my doubles. It means that I recover myself pretty nice.

ALEX CORRETJA: You could say Masters. It's the best memory for me. I don't know. I was asked the same yesterday. I said I'm in a good way. As I said yesterday, to reach this final, before I went to other tournaments and I played well, I won in Dubai, great step for me, first tournament on hard court ever, then I played finals in Hamburg, then afterwards I start to play well on hard courts, clay, indoors. It means my game improve everywhere I go. Now I'm able to play everywhere, I guess. Even if it's difficult, I have to fight, I have to go on the court knowing that I'm going to stay two, three hours. But that's my game. I'm proud of that. I mean, my game brought me a lot of good memories.

ALEX CORRETJA: I think for everybody it's important. I mean, if you find a guy who has pretty good serve, but he doesn't practice at all, I think he's going to be in trouble. But maybe he doesn't have to practice that much or that hard. But for me it's important, for sure. But for every player, as I said. My main game is to be fit, then I'm able to do some different shots, like cross-court like I did today, or some good backhands or good passing shots, coming to the net when it's necessary, come to play a slice. But if I'm not in good shape, I cannot do anything with that.

ALEX CORRETJA: (Inaudible) a virus that I had; I was exhausted. I was completely with no energy anymore. I had played a lot back in '98, all the other years, as well. I didn't rest. I didn't have time off. You got to rest. As a human being, you have to enjoy your life as well a little bit sometimes. I didn't. For me it was difficult. Once I came to this tournament, I start to realize that I was really tired. Then in Davis Cup against Brazil in April, something like this, I knew that I was not able to continue in my game. That's why I decided to rest a little bit. They say that I might have mononucleosis. I don't know how to say that. It wasn't exactly. I was like tired physically and mentally. It's a fatigue symptom, you know. It exceeds. There is not like you're tired; there's a symptom that you feel like dead the whole day.

ALEX CORRETJA: No, I love the game. Even if I suffer so much and I struggle, I won't say that. Sometimes, for sure, you like to be laying on the beach, something like this. But I still young. I think I can live my life maybe at the end of my career that way, no? In this moment, last year, I just wanted to have fun a little bit in a regular way. But I never thought like just quitting, just stop. That would be too much for me because I need the power and the adrenaline to be out there, to play all these kind of points. It's part of my life. It's been for the last 15 years. It's like a good drug for me.

ALEX CORRETJA: Well, the year I ended pretty nice. I cannot say that the year I ended pretty bad, because I won Masters the last week of the year. I would say that my recover for that many tournaments, it has to be different. You need to rest. If it's necessary, I mean, we got the best example last year when Sampras decided not to go to Australia. It seems like strange. But afterwards, I realize why he did it, because sometimes you cannot go every tournament a hundred percent. If you're not a hundred percent, it's better not to go. At the end, the only guy who is going to be in trouble, it's you. To get out from that, practice, other things, you got to do it, nobody else. That's the hardest thing to do. So I would say I would love to have the same thing, I would love to make hundreds of interviews back in Spain, TV programs, many sessions of photography, everything. I would love to do that again. Ten commercials, I would love to do that if I finish No. 3 again, win Masters, five tournaments. Then, I know I will have to rest, because otherwise I will go down again.

ALEX CORRETJA: What kind of drug would be?

ALEX CORRETJA: It would be nice to play the Americans because we would like to play against them in Davis Cup. It would be a good one step like playing against them. But it has to be in semifinals for us. Still a long way to go.

ALEX CORRETJA: You mean Davis Cup?

ALEX CORRETJA: For us, first we have to beat Russia, which is going to be really difficult, even. Even if we have good, strong team, we going to play on clay, we going to play home, so we always have some advantage. If we go to the semis, play the Americans, we would love to see that. It means that we are there. It's always nice to play on the bigger stadiums with the crowd behind you. It's better than to play outside court with ten people watching. It doesn't happen here because it's a big tournament, and fortunately was like pretty packed the whole day.

ALEX CORRETJA: My tennis dreams are to be as best as I can, as I could. I think where I've been dreaming, I've been realized already. When I was really young, I was dreaming to be a good tennis player, to be able to be in this kind of courts, to be Top 10, to see if I can win some big tournaments. I think I did it. It doesn't mean that I'm not going to continue, but I would say for me it's important. Tennis, it's like a good drug, as I said, but I have other things in my life which are maybe more important than that.

ALEX CORRETJA: The only nightmare I would see is just finding myself in a bad day, these kind of days where you don't know what to do, like it happens in Australia. You know, mentally, I was out of control. Physically, I didn't find my way. I felt so tired. That was the bad thing. But nightmares, I mean, the good thing is that you can lose, maybe you can see that you've been humiliated, but I can say that they kick you so hard, they beat you like real easy, but then afterwards nothing happens, you know. After two days, two hours, everything is gone. I mean, I went home and everything was easy again, everything was calm. I had my parents there, my family, my girlfriend. Everything was the same. It is pretty nice to win. It's pretty nice to go now and call my parents, and tell them how happy I am, they are back home. But if I lose 2-2, so what? You have to try your best. But once you lose like this, you cannot kill yourself, no?

ALEX CORRETJA: It's always a dream. But the only way to get these dreams is just go tournament by tournament. I tell you, this tournament, these special Masters Series, are much for Grand Slams. You've got to beat many Top-10 players that maybe in a Grand Slam you don't beat them because maybe they lost earlier. You play best-of-five every match. But to play every day six days of seven, this is rough, this is difficult. It means that I'm in a good way. But you never know. If I don't win a Grand Slam, I'm not going to, I don't know, get crazy.

ALEX CORRETJA: Well, they are both really great players, maybe different kind of games. I think they have advantage on me in their serves especially, especially Philippoussis - and Thomas as well. They are much taller. They have much more power. Maybe I'm faster than them. Maybe I'm smaller and I can just run all around the court. But it's going to be difficult for me, especially five sets. They can take a lot of free points from their serves. It's not going to be easy. But once you're here, I think you've got to try your best and see what you can do.

End of FastScripts….