US OPEN

September 4, 1998

Richard Krajicek

Q. Could you just briefly talk about the match today. Scorewise, it looked like it was pretty comfortable.

RICHARD KRAJICEK: First set was very comfortable. Second set he changed his game plan a little bit. He stayed back and I think he was hitting very good forehands. Normally it is his weaker side, but he hit a lot of winners with his forehand second set. End of second set, I had a lot of chances 5-4, 15-30, relative easy volley to go double set point at 6-5, had a couple of set points and I got a little tight on two of them, especially one of them easy forehands. You go into a tiebreak, he was 3-2 up serving with a mini break. Eventually I won that tiebreak. End of the second set was a little bit tight, after I won that it was pretty easy. So it was difficult for maybe 4-5 games, last 4-5 games in the second set. But before and after that, yeah, I think the scores said enough.

RICHARD KRAJICEK: I am serving pretty good. I had low percentage first serves especially in the first set, but my second serve was very good today. I think that is the most important. I mean, you cannot expect to hit your first serve good all the time. You cannot expect to hit aces when you are down breakpoint or when it is 30-All, so, my second serve was very good. I really feel confident about it. I can really rely on that shot. I am volleying solid and making a lot of returns. All over, my only game, which is the serve, is going well, the serve and volley, and then yeah, I put a lot of pressure on my opponent by making him hit a lot of shots, I put a lot of returns on the court. He knows to keep me back or else I am going to start coming in.

RICHARD KRAJICEK: Well, the courts favor serve and volley players this year, I think. But yeah, you still have to make the serves and especially make the volleys after that because you cannot keep on hitting the aces like I said before. But I feel very confident at the moment and I take it one match at a time, but I play two baseliners now and especially today, I think Alex has a pretty good return and he didn't have that much of a chance on my service game, so I think that is a good sign. If I can keep this level up, serve and volleying, I have a good chance of winning a couple more rounds.