US OPEN

September 8, 1998

Alex Corretja

Q. I think we owe you a lot of respect that you kept fighting even in the third set. Was there ever a point when you thought of actually quitting the match? I saw something like after the first set that you were both very upset with the way the crowd left the stadium and with the wind and the conditions. Was there a point when you said, "Let's quit this, try to play sometime tomorrow"?

ALEX CORRETJA: Was too long. I didn't understand anything.

ALEX CORRETJA: No, no, no. We have to play in any conditions. If it was windy, we have to play with that. We cannot do anything. Unfortunately, it was difficult to play, but it was for both players. We are not going to say, "Okay, let's go home, and tomorrow we'll see." What about if tomorrow is gets worse or it's raining? This is not indoor courts.

ALEX CORRETJA: I don't know. It's kind of funny your questions. I'm going to tell you that I was on the court. I'm not looking if the people is leaving or not. I agree. It was cold, it was windy. The match was not too good. If I would be a spectator, I would leave the same way. I don't know.

ALEX CORRETJA: No, it was on purpose. I'm not that bad. I could be really bad, but I just wanted to hit it as hard as I could. I wanted to see if I could make another home run, as well.

ALEX CORRETJA: Just trying to hit one ball really hard, to take out my bad feelings about losing that second set. At the same time, I was trying to hit as hard as I could to see if I could just pass the stadium, and I couldn't. It was good effort.

ALEX CORRETJA: Yeah, the tournament was quite good. I mean, I came here one month ago. My expectations were to do well. I play really good tennis in Indianapolis. I won the tournament. Here I reach the fourth round, which is never easy. It's always nice to be in the last rounds. At the same time, I feel I could be maybe playing better or something. I didn't play my best tennis. Tonight it was really difficult to play. It was not the night to show the people if you are a good player or not, just to try to win this round and to see for the next one if it will be better. I was trying to push the ball on the court, just try to fight and try to be concentrate. But if you had that many chances and you cannot get any one of them, then it's impossible to win.

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