TMS - INDIAN WELLS

March 19, 2000

Alex Corretja

GREG SHARKO: Our clean-shaven champion. Alex wins his second Tennis Masters career title, tenth overall ATP Tour of his career. He'll move to 6th in tomorrow's ATP champions race. First question.

ALEX CORRETJA: You can imagine how I feel. Maybe you cannot, I don't know. I can tell you, it's huge. It's really big for me, not especially to come back at the top; just especially to come back at my game, my style, my life on the court. That's the most important thing. The best thing in tennis is just to find yourself happy on the court, and I found it pretty nicely this week. Fortunately for me, I won a title again because since Hannover, I didn't win it. Last year I lost three finals, and none of them were like this important. This is really big. This is a Masters Series event, everyone playing here, so this is big for me.

ALEX CORRETJA: Well, yeah, especially last year I didn't play so much. During the year, I had some time off. Then especially at the end of the year, during November or something, I just rest a little bit. I went on vacations with my girlfriend and Albert Costa and his girlfriend as well. We went somewhere to relax, enjoy our life, have some fun, to be like a regular person, which sometimes it's not easy. Then I said, "Okay, from now on, since first of December, we start to work again." I changed my physical trainer. I continue with my coach. We just make a good plan to see if I can be back at the top. It means a lot for me because it seems like the good work, it's coming up. I don't know what's going to be my ranking, but that's not the most important thing. As I said, the best thing for me is to be realizing that I can be a good player again.

ALEX CORRETJA: Well, it's in my mind. In Australia, I was out of mind on that match. Lleyton is a really, really good player, so it's going to be difficult to beat him anyway. But for me, the main thing was that I kept going, you know. I didn't suffer too much about that. I just said, "Okay, it's a bad day, I going to forget it, I keep on working." Afterwards, we play pretty well in Davis Cup. Afterwards. I have like four weeks off. Everybody was thinking that maybe I was like having a rest because of Australia. It wasn't. I wanted to prepare well these tournaments. It seems that I prepared it perfectly at the moment.

ALEX CORRETJA: Well, I am tired. Of course, I am tired. But now I feel so happy, so I forget about the fatigue, you know. But, of course, I will be worry if I wouldn't be tired, huh? That would be strange. I'm serious. If you play six matches in seven days against these players, you might be tired. But you kept your mind on the court, you kept your physical condition. My game was perfect. Today I know Thomas did a lot of mistakes, but I think it's a combination of everything. When you see a guy that is running all around the court, he's making unbelievable passing shots, he's solid from the baseline, he's serving well. It's difficult, he makes a lot of mistakes. He went for it too much. Maybe he's tired. He also play really good matches the last couple of days. It's difficult for him as well. Fortunately for me, it was good that we could finish that early.

ALEX CORRETJA: Yeah, we have some.

ALEX CORRETJA: They built some hard courts like three, four years ago. We don't have indoor courts. That's a problem.

ALEX CORRETJA: Well, it helped a lot, of course. In Barcelona, like two weeks ago, three weeks ago, we were all practicing there, all together, Moya, Mantilla, Costa, Berasategui, Blanco, we were all there practicing on hard courts. Even if it's a different kind of game, because we all play from the baseline, you get a lot of rhythm. Once you get to the tournament, you are kind of ready to go. So then you've got to adapt your game with a serve-and-volley player or different player. At least you have a rhythm. So it's good. That's why we're proud that we have some hard courts. Now we're wait some indoor courts. Then we play some good tournaments as well.

ALEX CORRETJA: That's another thing.

ALEX CORRETJA: Before the match, absolutely. It was my best dream. During the match, I saw the chance to go in straight sets, especially when I came back strongly in the second set. He had a breakpoint. We play long rally. I stretch myself and I put like a backhand down the line. On that point, I realize that it was a great moment to keep it up, to keep on going. It was difficult for him. He could see that he could not break my serve. Then I hold serve. I serve pretty well for the set. I was like Love, I guess. It was kind of easy game. Even when if he broke me back in the third set, he was not in the match anymore. He was, as I said, kind of tired, not mentally focused in the third set. That help me a lot. He was serving second serve like 115 miles per hour. I knew some double-faults would come on. I have to say when he was serving to save the second match point, I was praying to him to like to double-fault it again. I was like, "Just double-fault. Don't make me play again. Please, just leave me alone." I didn't even react. I was like, "He double-faulted. It exist, it exist."

ALEX CORRETJA: No, no, because he's a kind of player which he likes to play the ball really hard, really like flat. He serves pretty well. He returns well. So I was trying to play really long and high or really like low and short. I didn't want to play in the middle of the court. So every time I did it, he was hitting for a winner, he went for it. At the end, he was making more mistakes. But it was because, as I said, no, I was playing solid. It was really good game from my part, I guess.

ALEX CORRETJA: I was glad I was passing him well, that was the main thing. He was going to the net, as I said, because he was forcing too much. He saw from the baseline he had to go for really big shots. I believe he said to himself, "Just attack and see how it goes." Sometimes is difficult because you see a really tall guy on the net, and it's difficult to pass him. I put like a lot of balls under his feet. It was difficult. And then I always end up passing him. Many times I did that. That's why maybe he was kind of like, I don't know, disappointed or nervous at the end because he didn't know how to win the points unless he made an ace or a point with his serve. That was important for me, knowing once we go to the rallies, I had much more chances than him. That was really important for myself.

ALEX CORRETJA: With the other guys?

ALEX CORRETJA: With the Spanish guys?

ALEX CORRETJA: We talk about everything. We are normal, no? What do you talk with your friends? We talk about soccer, we talk - everything (laughter). It's clear, no?

ALEX CORRETJA: For us it's really nice to be out of home, keep in touch with your friends, you know. It's difficult because they are friends. Once you get to the court, they are your opponents. Sometimes it's not easy. But you got just to be a hundred percent sure what you want, you know. Once you go to the court, you got to be professional, you got to do your job and forget about the other guy. Be polite, respect him, that's all, even if he's your friend or your brother, whatever. Once you're finish, you can always be his friend. Last week, doesn't matter, but it does. I went for dinner with Albert Costa every night. We play quarterfinals in Scottsdale. The night before, we had room service in my room. We just saw movie. We play Pay TV. We watch something like James Bond or something, something funny. We order some pizzas. The next day we're fighting so much. As you see the score, it was 7-6 in the third. It didn't mean that we went to the court like happy and fun. No, we just work. But once you get off from the court, you're friends. Moya, Mantilla, Ferrero, Mantilla. We're human beings, no? I believe we are not machines.

ALEX CORRETJA: We went someplace in Spain. We didn't want to take the plane and go really far away. We went to Malaga, which is south of Spain. It's really sunny. We played some golf, we try to play some "golf," girlfriends went to the pool, had some fun, shopping and all this stuff. You know how womens are in this aspect. It's nice. They really go with each other pretty well. It's really good for us, as well. You know, women, sometimes they get mad after ten days ago. I believe mens, we're not like this. We keep the same relationship forever. They get always mad because if she dress like this or if she dress like that. Fortunately, Costa and my girlfriend, they are not like this - for the moment. I told them already, because we wanted to build like a house, we wanted to buy a land next to each other. We said, "We don't want it to be like 'I like more his bathroom, I don't like this corridor.' We don't want it to be jealous, we want to be friends forever."

ALEX CORRETJA: No, not all womens. I'm not talking general. I'm saying some. No, no, no. I'm saying some of them, sometimes they get mad. I don't know why. Too many problems for nothing. We don't have these kinds of problems, fortunately. I love womens, and I love especially my girlfriend and my mom (laughter).

ALEX CORRETJA: Of course. Are you married (laughter)?

ALEX CORRETJA: The whole week was difficult. I don't know. Many matches went down, then I came back. Not many, just two of them. Like against Rafter, we had a really tough match. Then I came back in the third set strongly and I won. The next day against Santoro, was a difficult day for me. I start pretty bad, then I came back. Against Norman, the same. Yesterday, I dominated from the beginning, yesterday and today. I won in straight sets today. I believe Rafter and Santoro were the more difficult moments for me.

ALEX CORRETJA: Last year or this year?

ALEX CORRETJA: What do you mean?

ALEX CORRETJA: If I believe that I can come back to this point?

ALEX CORRETJA: Once you're there, I mean, you did it already, so once you win a big tournament, you always think that you can win it again, but you got to trust in yourself. The most important thing is you got to believe. There is a song that said, "Believe." It's truth. You got to believe in yourself to know that you can do it again. I mean, if you did it once or twice, why you cannot do it again? The difficult part is just to do all these efforts, you know, just practice again, go to sleep, have pasta every night, stretch before the match, stretch after the match, then do massage, talk to everybody. All these things, you got to get used to. Sometimes you get tired of that and you like to go somewhere else. It's nice to be here again like sitting here as a champion. I have to say that.

ALEX CORRETJA: Well, I would love to believe that, but I never won it before. That's not the point. As I said before, when you did it, you know you can do it again. Of course, I have to believe it. I don't know if I can do it. That's different. I believe I can win Roland Garros, but I don't know if I'm going to do it, no? I believe nobody knows it.

ALEX CORRETJA: As you know, he lives here. We are friends. It's difficult to keep in touch. Every time we see here, we talk a little bit, not that much. It's good for me to see that Jose won here. I'm here again, another Spanish winning in Indian Wells. It happens in The Masters, Orantes won the last one back in '76, so I won in '98. We're kind of again in the future, these days. They are back like '80s or '70s.