ATP TOUR WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP

November 19, 1994

Boris Becker

BORIS BECKER: Well, I was feeling a bit fresher, you know, five, six days ago, but that is what you expect. You have the toughest competition here of all the players. They are all champions and you are supposed to feel tired after the semifinal, but I think I will manage one more day.

BORIS BECKER: Yes and no. I saw his round robin matches and he obviously won two matches. He gave Andre a tough match last night. So I knew he is in excellent form. But it is different when you see it on the television than when you play against him, and he really had a big chance of coming out as the winner of the match. He had me down 15-40 at 4-All, he had another breakpoint and pretty easy backhand passing shot where he usually hits it a little harder, and he hit it a little bit high and I was able to get my racket on it. And that was the big chance for him to win the match.

BORIS BECKER: Well, I think all of us, all the four players have a few talks, a few conversations with the umpire concerning the people on the lines. I don't know why or for whatever reason, there are supposed to be not only the best players here, but also the best people on the line. It didn't seem the case. They had many, many bad calls on both sides in all of the matches, and so we are both a little bit angry about that and we just wanted to tell the umpire that he maybe should check the lines a bit more; overrule where there is really a mistake. But then again, it is difficult to please them all. When the guy makes an overrule, one player is going to be upset, so. . . But all in all, the linesmen haven't been the best this week.

BORIS BECKER: Well, definitely, once you sat down and you are facing many breakpoints in the second set, you just somehow -- you are looking for air to breathe. You are looking for that little light at the end of the tunnel. You cannot really think at that moment about skills or about tactics. You just want to survive. And I fought very hard in the second set, and I played better in the third set.

BORIS BECKER: One of the rare occasions where I have to beat the No. 1 twice in one week to win a whole championship, but that is the system. And I, again, have to raise my level of playing. He is playing a little bit better each match and it is going to be a longer match, you know, with probably many ups and downs, and I am in for a tough battle.

BORIS BECKER: I hope the outcome isn't that different. The match, itself, is going to be serve and volley game, I would say, unless he is changing his tactics overnight. And from my point of view, everybody knows how I am playing. It is just a little longer, meaning you can have a bad start or you can have one bad set and you are still into the competition which it is something I like very much. But, you know, Pete also likes best of five matches, so we are in there for a very tough match for both players, yeah. I would say the big difference, our first match there was that on Wednesday he was supposed to win tomorrow, I think we are on even stands and that is the biggest difference.

BORIS BECKER: There have been some people calling up this week, but unfortunately they have been calling up many weeks in the year and it is just some of the things which are not good about being in the spotlight, but, you know, we have many people who are guarding it not only me, but all the players, and we should be fine by tomorrow.

BORIS BECKER: I personally didn't talk to anybody. I don't know what he or she had exactly in mind, I don't know.

BORIS BECKER: It is both. It is a pressure because the expectations are so high, they expect me to perform well. They expect me to make the last point. But on the other hand, those expectations can lift my spirits as well, and if the crowd wouldn't have supported me not only today, but in the last couple of tough matches, the outcome might have been different, so once I am able to play good tennis, they really help me a lot and I hope they do the same thing tomorrow what they have been doing all week long. But still they were fair and it wasn't that they were trying to bother my opponents. They were just very much into the whole match and very much also behind me.