TMS - THE ERICSSON OPEN

March 24, 2001

Greg Rusedski

THE MODERATOR: First question, please.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Well, I can't remember. I think David played great today. I mean, I had a few chances the first five games. I think I had 15-30, one break point. I sat down with Pat and Brad in the locker room, we just figured out, we just kind of worked that backhand return with a little bit more on the returns and worked the passing shots a little bit more. But I have to give credit to him today. He played awfully well. Once he got that first break in the first set, hit every ball as hard as he could, every return. He just made the shots. That's too good. I don't think I've seen him play that well. He has these weeks, like two or three weeks every year where he just gets really, really hot like he did at Halle last year. He played very well.

GREG RUSEDSKI: I think I nearly got him out of it. You know, when he got the break and then he started to get a little bit tight he played that tight game where I got the service break back, third game second set. He hit two balls that nearly hit the back stop on the fly with slow slices. Then he just relaxed again, started swinging again and everything started working. It was tough. I didn't serve too badly, but he just played awfully well today.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Yeah, he just returned awfully well. I had a lot of games 30-love, then he'd get break point, then we'd go deuce, ad, deuce, ad. The score was 3-2 which looked quite easy. But every game I was in, even on the returns and even on my serve, but when it counted, you know, he just swung at everything. With his technique, the way he plays, if he's having a hot day like that he can beat anybody. But if he just goes slightly, slightly off, you know, it can spray pretty badly. But today, unfortunately, that didn't happen for me.

GREG RUSEDSKI: I tried mixing up the serve. I went to the forehand, I went to the backhand, I went to the kick, I stayed back a little bit. But he just played awfully well. Too good today.

GREG RUSEDSKI: I was serving the corners. I thought, geez, I was serving well in the corners, I thought just go full stretch, give it a whack and a swing. I think if you ask David, he'll probably give you a good smile and say he returns like that every day. If he did, he'd be, you know, he'd be a little bit higher ranked if he could play like that every single day.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Yeah, he has.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Yeah, no, it's great. I mean good for him. Playing well, he played a good match. He was the better player today. But another learning experience for me. If I could have pulled out one or two points and it could have cooled off slightly, it might have been a different change. But not in the cards today when the guy is swinging like that.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Yeah, I guess it's just, you know, whenever I hit the let cord it kind of went against me, whenever he hit it, it kind of worked for him. I mean, I had maybe one point to get back in the second set with a forehand passing shot on the run which wasn't an easy one but one I should have made. Apart from that he played pretty well. I still was fighting every single game but he was just a better player, played very well.

GREG RUSEDSKI: I'm going to have a nice rest I think for three or four days, and then Pat and I and Brad and Ryan are going to get back to work for about four or five days and work on some returns, work on some passing shots and just really clean it up and keep on improving. We're happy with the serve. If the guy returns like that and you give him a target, that's too good on the day. But if I can get my returns better, if I can get my passing shots a little bit better, then I can raise my game another level. We're still looking to build and, you know, you can't do anything but say too good today and just continue to improve and get ready for Birmingham.

GREG RUSEDSKI: I can't do anything about that. If one of you would have been nice enough to come on court maybe, you know, trip him up a little bit, maybe I'd still be through. But you didn't give me any help in that respect. I think that was the only way I was going to get through with the way he played today.

GREG RUSEDSKI: I'm not sure yet. Haven't figured it out.

GREG RUSEDSKI: I'm not really worried about that to be honest with you. I'm just worried about improving my tennis, playing well. You know, it would be interesting. If they seed 32, then maybe I have a chance. If they don't seed 32, then I probably won't. That's fine by me as well. I mean, Krajicek, I think, when he won the tournament, wasn't seeded. You know, you just got to play good tennis. If you play good tennis, you win, takes care of itself.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Well, maybe if my Race is in the Top 10, maybe. There's a possibility. But I don't really worry about that. That's out of my control. That's nothing I can do. And, you know, I don't worry about it. Last year -- I have a lot of points to defend during grass court season, so there's nothing much to worry about.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Ask John. John knows better than I would back there.

GREG RUSEDSKI: No, it's just talking about the match. Obviously, today I'm a little bit frustrated. I thought I had a good chance to play well here, I did a good preparation. But I played a guy who just played great. So it's very frustrating because, you know, you've done your preparation, you feel like you're playing well, then you have a guy who just plays probably one of the best matches of his life ever. And, you know, that's tough. But, you know, we talked about it. We're going to sit down afterwards tonight and figure out whether we're going to stay and practice. I want to take probably three, four days out and we're going to figure out what we're going to do. Brad's going to look at the match, and he's going to figure out --look at the tape, look at where I went wrong, where I went right, what I did right, what I did wrong. So we'll analyze it, figure it out and get back to the drawing board.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Well that, in part, yes. I agree the guy played great. If I would have made a few more returns coming over instead of chipping in the beginning, that could have made a difference, because then he would have had to hit harder volleys, make one or two passing shots, one or two points here and there, staying back, mixing it up. There's always little things you can do. I always believe it's one guy against one guy. You're always in control of what can happen out there. Even if the guy plays great, you still want to find a solution, why you lost, what could I have done better. Even if you would have done those things better, you might still not have won. But it would have been a better match, a closer match. So it's always those things to look forward to.

GREG RUSEDSKI: No, I didn't see any of it at all.

GREG RUSEDSKI: I think it's difficult. It all depends on how the first-round match goes. You know, if I go five sets in the first singles rubber, it's very difficult to come back the next day and play the doubles. But hopefully I won't go five sets, then I can play the doubles. If I don't go 10-8 in the fifth. That's where it's very important for us to have a doubles pair or some youngsters who are coming through to help us. If you look at all the countries that win the Davis Cup, you look at Spain, they got the back depth 10 to 15 players; France, 10 players; Australia, I mean you got Philippoussis, Rafter, Hewitt, Arthurs can come in and play. We need some younger players to come in and help us. That's so important for us right now. You know, we can get back probably to the Top 16 nations, but if we get a favorable draw we can progress. But when we're going to be going away to say Spain on clay, imagine if Tim plays five sets and wins a fantastic match for us, then you have to ask him to come out and play the doubles on the Saturday and then the reverse on the next day, it's very, very difficult. So I think realistically we can get back to the 16, Top 16 nations. If we're at home or on a quick court, we've got a good chance to progress. But if we get in some of the tough draws we've got a lot of problems because we don't have enough depth in the team.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Yes, I get this question very, very often. I don't know. I mean Patrice is trying this new formula. If he can run the same formula as they have in France and get as many kids into the game, that would be great. But I don't know if that works in England and in the UK. So I don't know where to start, to be honest with you. I'm just still concentrating on my career and, you know, looking forward to my tennis. It's very difficult. I hope someone comes up because, you know, Tim just came along all of a sudden out of the blue, and really helped British tennis tremendously. Now hopefully we need someone else to do the exact same thing, to come join us.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Yeah. Well, maybe we'll bring Neil Broad back.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Last time I played a doubles match, Brighton (inaudible). That was the last time. Well, we could bring him in, you know.

GREG RUSEDSKI: We got to the semis. We played two, I believe, three matches in total.

GREG RUSEDSKI: That was -- yeah. It's been a few years, yeah. But you know, I work on those returns, we'll be all right.

GREG RUSEDSKI: A little bit. I mean Cunha Silva, I remember watching him play on clay. He's a very good competitor and fighter. Hopefully, we have the right surface this time in Birmingham.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Yeah, I think it's going to be a supreme sort of court, it will be pretty quick, pretty slick and low-bouncing. They won't be able to get the ball up too high and we can play our attacking sort of style. Those guys are pretty good on the clay, on the baseline on a slow court. But it favors us to be in that sort of surface. I think even though both of us had early round losses here, I think both of us are hitting the ball pretty well this year and our win-loss records are all right. We're heading in the right direction even though, you know, we both had tough losses this week.

GREG RUSEDSKI: No, it's not going to be the wood.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Yeah, it is. That's what Roger told me, yeah.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Yeah.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Exactly. I think it's a good place for us to play. We got 10,000 full, we get the people who enjoy tennis, we get the regular people who don't always necessarily come to tennis. It's in the middle of the country, so it's a nice place to play.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Well, I'll try to get on the bandwagon and publicize and get the ten in there. (Laughter.)

GREG RUSEDSKI: Yeah, I think it's great. I mean, against America we had a great chance do win. Unfortunately, we didn't get through. But then we beat South Africa. I think it's a nice venue for us. We played well there. I think, you know, when you get back to tradition, you get back to the World Group and give them another tie like America versus Britain, if we can give them a tie like that again and win, then we can have that maybe as a permanent venue and something the public can get really into.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Yeah, I think it's a great idea if they can do it, it's good. Because, you know, I think, for example, what the French Federation has which is a big advantage, is they have their Grand Slam and their training center at the same facility. You know, I don't know if they have played Davis Cup matches at Roland Garros or not --.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Not in recent years, but it's a nice thing to have everything combined and to try to bring a tradition into an area where everybody can feel like sort of a home base for the players of where they're coming through. It's a nice concept, nice idea. Especially if it was the Davis Cup arena, per se, that would kind of say, okay, a younger child is watching TV, says, "I'm six, I'm seven, eight," says I want to play Davis Cup there or something to that extent, it kind of helps to bring things sometimes.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Well, I think it's a good idea to get somewhere -- if you can get all the players to train there and to work out together physically and to have the doctors in the facility, and if it runs the same as the French Federation does and brings the camaraderie together, I think it's a great thing. Because I think you look at the French, I think they have one of the best systems in the world. You never see them without six to twelve guys in the Top 100. Never. They have good camaraderie. Look at Grosjean, Clement. Those are two guys that overachieve all the time. Great players, great competitors. But you know what, their physical size and stature, what they do is sensational. Clement getting to the finals in Australia, Grosjean getting to the semis. Their physical fitness, their shape is really great. Every ball, every match, if we could bring that in, that sort of camaraderie. All the French guys get along very well. They're all sort of a team spirit. So if it works, that's fantastic.

GREG RUSEDSKI: Yeah, it would be great. You'd have everything. If you had the swimming pool, you had the gym, you had the tennis courts, you have everything. It's, you know, if it's going to be as good as the French Federation, then why not? It would be great. It's good for the younger players to see what the older players are doing as well, and to get to know them. Then when they come on Tour they get more confidence because they say I've been around him, I've hit with him, I know I can beat him in a few games. I'll have all these youngsters giving me a hard time.

GREG RUSEDSKI: I don't think I've seen enough, to be honest with you, to comment on that. You know, if I had more time and I could see that, I could make a comment. But I'm really trying to -- I'm still trying to get back on my tennis.