WIMBLEDON

June 21, 2004

Anne Keothavong

THE MODERATOR: May I present Anne Keothavong.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: I don't know. It was one of my better matches on grass, yeah, that's for sure. No, I'm happy with the way it went today, I think. It was a good match.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: Yeah, that's right. I think the rain delay helped me enormously. It gave me a chance to just calm down and regroup. I was pretty nervous when I went out there, which is understandable, I guess. But, yeah, it did help me. I managed to calm down and just go back out there and play.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: It's the first time we've played against one another. And she's a pretty solid player. You know, she's solid from the back, and she's quick around the court. But, you know, I thought if I could just concentrate and focus on my own game, then it would go my way.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: I think, yeah, you know, I was more aggressive than she was. I was at the court, going for my shots more than her. But at the same time I managed to stay solid and hang in there on the tougher points.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: In a senior event, yeah.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: This was my fourth year in the main event.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: This is the best I felt coming into the tournament. When I compare it to the last few years, I feel like I'm a better player, and also older and, you know, more mature with the way I play. But it's nice to finally get a win under my belt here.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: Yeah, Tony still advises me. Colin Beech is my coach. He'll travel with me, but Tony is still very much involved.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: Yeah.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: Yeah. I spoke to him, I spoke to Colin. Yeah, they've both helped me enormously.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: I guess it is. I think she's the highest-ranked player I've beaten, so yeah.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: I was.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: You know, it was different, and it opened my eyes up to a different way of training. I had a good time and it was a good experience there. But I'm now based back home in London.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: She was great. She helped all of us girls. She gave a talk, any questions, anything we wanted to ask her, she was happy to answer, just about the tour, how to deal with everything. And, yeah, she was really good fun.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: We spent on court with her, off court with her. On court, she's very good. I mean, she's still a great player. I mean she pretty much duffed all of us up pretty much still. Off court, she was really relaxed. Everyone got on well with her. It was just nice to have someone who has been so high, you know, at the top end of the game around to help and talk to us.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: No, no, no. You know, I'm sure -- I haven't seen her around yet this week. It would be nice to catch up, you know, when we see her. But for the camp in America, she was very good.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: I mean, I don't know, you know. It's been an ongoing thing with myself, Elena Baltacha, Jane O'Donoghue. We've all managed to push each other and we're all doing well. I think the women's side of the game in this country is definitely going in the right direction. You might look at our rankings and say, "Well, you know, this isn't good enough," whatever. But we know that and we're trying our hardest out there. You know, we're all positive and we all know if we work hard enough, we can do it.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: It's silly for me to, you know, think about that. It's just one match at a time. The next match, I don't know who I play yet. They haven't played. But, you know, just one match at a time is good enough for me.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: Nice offer, isn't it? Yeah, it's a good incentive for all of us girls to do well here. We all want to do well here anyway, whether there was that amount of money sitting there for one of us to take or whatever. We all want to perform well here at Wimbledon.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: Yeah. I mean, it would be great. But, again, it's just one match at a time. Nobody wants to look too far ahead.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: I was born in Hackney. I started playing tennis when I was seven. I played short tennis before, it's just something my parents introduced us to to keep us occupied. When I was younger, I spent a lot of time playing at Highbury Fields. Yeah, they had a good setup there during the summer.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: Yeah. They helped me from the age of 10. They helped fund my coaching. So, yeah.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: Yeah, I still play there. There's quite a few parks round where I live. There's Highbury Fields, there's Clissold Park, Hackney Downs. You know, a tennis court is a tennis court. It's convenient.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: No. I mean, I've been trying to play on grass as much as I can while the weather's been good. No, I did play with my little brother there a week ago.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: Clissold Park.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: Mark.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: That was in December when we had an adidas camp in Phoenix. She was there for 10 days with us.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: Yeah, I recall her, you know, just tells us to try and enjoy it. I think that was probably the best advice you can give to anyone. You can get caught up with whatever else is going on, but just, you know, take a step back and enjoy it.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: Yeah. Once I got going, yeah.

ANNE KEOTHAVONG: No, Laotian. My mother is from Laos as well.