WESTERN AND SOUTHERN FINANCIAL GROUP MASTERS

August 12, 2003

Mardy Fish

MARDY FISH: Yeah, I mean, I just came out flat and I wasn't aggressive. I wasn't playing my game. He was kind of lulling me to sleep there a little bit as far as when he would, you know, when he was at the back of the court and just slicing a lot. And, you know, kind of messes up your rhythm a little bit. And, you know, I just kind of told myself early in the second set just to keep staying aggressive. And, you know, that's my game, and I have to do that to win; if I don't, I'm gonna lose. Basically what it boils down to.

MARDY FISH: Yeah, you know, I said before to my coach, I said, you know, "Basically what it boils down to here is I have to hold serve, then I have to take advantage of my opportunities on his -- on my return games."And, you know, I think I did that. I think I had -- I don't know what I was in breakpoints, but I was probably two or three or something like that maybe. I think I maybe lost one. But, you know, he gave me a little gift there at the end with a double-fault. But, you know, I think that was a little bit of credit to my returning, second serve returning. I tried to stay as aggressive as I could. He was serving right into my strength, right into my backhand. So I was happy about that.

MARDY FISH: Yeah. I mean, you know, mentally, I know that I'm there, and I know that I'm not going to give up. Maybe a couple years ago I might have gone down 6-1 to a guy in the Top 20 like that and just kind of bailed. I know now that I can beat those guys, whether I'm down a set and a break, or 6-1. I pretty much got blown out in the first set. I mean, I won one game, but he played a great first set. I mean, he was passing me from all angles. And, you know, I just stayed positive and aggressive. And, you know, that's what I have to do to win.

MARDY FISH: Yeah, I mean, he's a pretty intimidating guy. He's a big guy and a big server and a big forehand when he really wants to hit it. And he, yeah, he can be very intimidating. So, yeah, I mean, you have to kind of go out there with no fear and just have a lot of confidence that you can beat him playing your game.

MARDY FISH: He's been awesome. I mean, when he played, he played almost exactly like me, you know. He had a good first serve and he came to the net all the time. And I think he's got a lot of good advice for me as far as, you know, knowing -- he knows my game now, you know, being with me for a year. We're just -- we're kind of starting to click here. You know, it takes a while to get used to somebody like that, used to a new coach. If you don't look at Andy, then a lot of other people are normal, and Andy kind of is a little bit under the norm. I mean, he's, you know, he's so different in everything that he does. And, you know, he came out, he usually takes a while to get to the Top 50. It took him a couple tournaments (snapping). He switches coaches, and right away he plays well. It's not as easy as he makes it seem. So, you know, we're kind of getting used to each other, and, you know, we're having a lot of fun. He has -- he makes me out there have a lot of fun and be a lot more relaxed, you know. Because you can get uptight and you can get, you know, you can get out of your -- mentally, you can get out of the game a lot. He kind of keeps me grounded and he keeps me having fun.

MARDY FISH: Yeah, I'd like to think that I could do some of the things that he's done. You know, but, again, he's a pretty amazing guy in that there's nobody out here that, you know, wants it more than him. I mean, there's probably people, but he wants it so bad and he's got the game to do it. You know, he's, for me, he's one of the funnest guys out there to watch because he's just, away from being my friend, he's an amazing tennis player and just fun to watch.

MARDY FISH: No. Yeah, I mean, anybody in the Top 50 can beat anybody. You know, I was around 75 when I beat Moya twice. Whether he played well or not is beside the point. You've got to play pretty well to beat somebody in the Top 5 twice in a row. A match like this today, though, losing the first set to somebody who's Top 20 and then coming back and winning is a huge confidence builder for me. I don't think I've -- I can't remember off the top of my head losing a set that badly against a player like that, of that quality, and then coming back and winning. It's going to help me confidence-wise to know I got to hang in there and anything can happen.

MARDY FISH: You know, they always say -- there's a lot of people saying that "they can't succeed the past generation." And those guys, you know, those guys were unbelievable. They were competing for Grand Slam titles every Slam. You know, I don't know if we could do that, but we have a lot of talent in the group coming up. We're all very young. There's no telling in three, four, five years what's going to go on. I mean, you know that Andy obviously has been in two semis this year and has been one of the more consistent guys out there. I mean, you can see in the Champions Race that he's coming up pretty strong here. You know, he's only 20 years old. Then you got Robby Ginepri who's 22 -- 20 as well; you know, me that's 21; James is 23. You know, oldest one is 23, and that's not old.

MARDY FISH: Yeah, we get along great. We play cards and go out to dinner like every night.

MARDY FISH: It's different. Those guys, like I said before, they were competing for Grand Slam titles like every Slam. So who knows if that's different. But, I mean, I've played Andy twice and we're still -- we still don't have any problems playing. James, I've played James one time, you know. But, I mean, we're gonna play each other 20 times, I'm sure, over our careers. We'll see after we have a couple battles and something, you know, something gets heated, if we still stay friends, but I'm sure we won't have any trouble doing that.