ROLAND GARROS

May 31, 2024

Stefanos Tsitsipas

Press Conference

S. TSITSIPAS/Z. Zhizhen

6-3, 6-3, 6-1

THE MODERATOR: Was it your best match of the tournament so far?

STEFANOS TSITSIPAS: I would assess today's performance as one of the best matches I have played so far in this tournament. It's great to see myself in a position to get out there and play so effectively but also accurately at the same time.

I feel like my shots were very precise. Wherever I was aiming, I was able to produce some really high-quality shots, but in combination with precision, that made it much easier for me to come up with great play, but also to raise my confidence as the match proceeded.

THE MODERATOR: Questions, please.

Q. You said you felt very good out there. This season how important was that win in Monte-Carlo to get maybe a little bit extra energy and belief for this tournament?

STEFANOS TSITSIPAS: Not having a win in few months and regaining my strength and walking away from Monte-Carlo with a victory, it brought me back into a great mindset of I have now this under my belt, and I can really proceed with great confidence towards the next clay court tournaments.

As an athlete, having titles like this under your belt is important walking into a tournament like Roland Garros, which has great history. I would say it's obviously a surface very familiar to the one in Monte-Carlo.

I find it important for me to know that I have good wins, good runs in tournaments. It for sure adds up to your confidence starting with a Grand Slam debut.

Q. I know it's all work and business for you out there, but compared to other years, what is your sort of fun and enjoyment level at this point in the tournament when you are playing, or are you not able to sort of get to that space when you're competing?

STEFANOS TSITSIPAS: Well, for me the most fun out of all of this is when I'm able to come up with some great shots. It's a lot of fun. Trust me, when you're able to get a good, clean contact with the ball and get it to land exactly where you're looking for it to land, there's no better satisfaction and feeling. That brings joy into your game.

That makes you want to do it again, so you challenge yourself. Let's do it again. Can I? Let's do it again. That is a new challenge that you get to interact with during the match, during a battle out on the court.

When you're able to repetitively produce these kind of shots, when you're able to create angles, when you're able to defend and win a point that perhaps you shouldn't have won, it brings great joy into the game, and it makes you want to play even longer and get to feel the game even more.

Q. Speaking of joy, one of the things that I think you bring joy to the game is that you make some interesting comments about life and so forth. You recently wrote to tennis and said, Tennis, you taught me to live life as it goes, to never doubt, and to just keep on living regardless of the outcome. Could you just do a little bit of a deeper dive on that, what your thoughts were?

STEFANOS TSITSIPAS: It's the game that I chose, and it does have an expire date. So far it's the biggest pleasure in my life because I get to interact with it pretty much every single week. I have a very close bond and relationship with tennis because it's the thing that occupies most of my life and something that I'm spending most of my time focusing on.

I get the feeling that without tennis my life would have been so much different in regards of challenging myself, seeking goals in life, because through tennis I'm able to set goals for my own personal life. Like, I want to have a certain picture of my life, and tennis helps me fill out those dreams and fulfill my deepest desires as a human being.

Q. Well done, and especially Monte-Carlo, but also all the other tournaments. Now you have to play an Italian. You know Arnaldi. What do you know about him? Because not so many people know him, and even if he is 35 now in the world, so he is getting better and better, and today won three straight sets with Rublev. What do you expect? I mean, when you play a player when you are strongly favorite, is it more difficult sometimes to not lose concentration, to be able to face a new guy, or it's just routine?

STEFANOS TSITSIPAS: What you do want is to be cautious in every single circumstance and match that you get to play. I have been keeping an eye on him. I know exactly what kind of a profile of player he is because I saw him play in Barcelona, I saw him play in Rome, I saw him play here.

I have been keeping an eye on him the last six months, I would say, when he really started making bigger appearances on the ATP Tour. So he's definitely someone that gets out on the court and fights repetitively. He doesn't give up. I've noticed that on him.

He's a very good fighter. When it comes to the battle, he will fight and he will not give up. This is something for sure that I do expect. He has a strong desire to, like, do well in what he does.

There are certain profile of players that you can notice that more and other ones not so much, let's say. They're a little more passive. He gets really into the game, and this is something that I for sure need to approach it with caution and build around it, find my ways around it.

It's almost like a river. You have to find ways around it and reroute and figure it out.

Q. You are an older brother of another professional player and also an aspiring other younger brother. I'm curious how do you see your role in that, and I guess the benefit and challenges of your stature as a top player in helping them to be the best players they can be? And, also, would it be harder to play singles, doubles, or mixed here or at the Olympics?

STEFANOS TSITSIPAS: Helping my brothers or my brother specifically?

Q. Brothers.

STEFANOS TSITSIPAS: Brothers, yes. I have been supporting obviously because they want to play professional tennis, and this is something that, well, comes completely naturally from my side because I completely understand what it takes to make it into professional tennis.

Petros, on his side of things, he's trying to get as good as he can possibly in doubles. This is his craft. This is the genre of tennis that he's trying to focus on.

Pavlos, on the other hand, he has had good results recently in singles. He's obviously trying to build himself up into making it into the challenger level tournaments. He has a very similar tennis to mine, Pavlos. He's tall, and he has a big reach, let's say, for a guy his age. When I see him play, I feel like he has those elements that I used to have when I was his age.

It's going to be interesting from Pavlos's side. I don't know yet how much he can take on the constant routine and pressures that the tour entails, but I'm there to support him and give him a chance into professional tennis.

On the other hand, playing doubles and mixed doubles, well, it is something that you do think off. No one does it. Why should you do it? I realized after thinking about it that you are in a phase of your life where tennis really brings you joy and pleasure, and you want to be here and spend time with your loved ones also, but also focus professionally.

This is not something that I do very often when I'm on the tour. I don't focus on these kind of things. I am very in my own type of thing.

Being here and being a little bit more free-spirited in a way, I guess, helps me out in ways that I get to have a sweeter interaction with my game, but also fall, in a way, in love with it a little bit more.

Q. Was it hard to adjust your game to these wet and cold conditions because sometimes you are making it look easy?

STEFANOS TSITSIPAS: Well, I thought about it, and it's something that has to happen a few times during the year where rain interrupts play, but it has a bigger effect on clay courts obviously because of the surface itself.

I feel like it hasn't had a big impact in terms of my game and the effectiveness of it. It's been working out pretty well. Well, I'm used to playing warmer conditions, and I grew up playing in warmer conditions with a bigger bounce to the ball, but today I had a great, let's say, line of touch with whatever I was doing during the match.

I didn't feel like many things affected me, and I started at a certain level, and I finished at that exact same level at the end of the match. So there were not many interruptions in my momentum during the match.