AUSTRALIAN OPEN

January 18, 2006

Mario Ancic

THE MODERATOR: Questions, please.

MARIO ANCIC: I think I started off extremely well and was really playing my game throughout the whole match and coming in a lot, playing a lot of volleys. Played twice with Jan before. Both very tough matches. I knew the game plan. And, you know, I'm happy with the way I executed.

MARIO ANCIC: Yeah, for sure it helps. I think it started even before. It was already for two, three years, me, Ivan and Karlovic were, you know, three Croatians in top hundred. Ivan had such a great year last year, and for sure all our three is in a good form and trying to play better. Helps in Davis Cup.

MARIO ANCIC: Yeah, I mean, we are a small country and we are all happy for each other. It's much nicer that there is even more of us in top hundred. Two guys who are close hopefully can come in. We have second junior in the world, and hopefully there gonna be lot of us so we can stay long time in the top of world's tennis.

MARIO ANCIC: Yeah, of course. Yes, because it's such a big result. Lot of people are, you know, buying racquets and starting to play like as well as when Goran won Wimbledon and when Goran was top, was lot of people just picking up racquets and started practicing before because of him. Of course it helps picking up tennis in Croatia. But we are really a sport nation, had a lot of huge stars since. Doesn't matter young or old, we are all doing some kind of sport.

MARIO ANCIC: The situation about team is great. We have playing captain. Ivan would be playing captain for this match against Austria. After match, we will see, speak with Goran. And, you know, I mean, we all agree about that. I think the most important is to keep this team spirit, and I think we all have that, and willingness to win. We have extremely tough first round. We are all professionals and we are going to try to do our best.

MARIO ANCIC: Yeah, little bit. But we had such a long year last year because of Davis Cup. I was immediately after, like couple days after the Davis Cup, we started to prepare for new season. This 15 days which we have was really heavy work. Then again we started in -- Ivan started in Chennai. I started in Adelaide. Had a good week last week. I think was better for both of us just because we played a lot of tennis and a lot of fitness with it. Is maybe better to have this day off tomorrow than go out and try to play doubles. But usually we always play, and it was just because of that.