US OPEN

September 7, 2006

Tommy Haas

THE MODERATOR: Questions for Tommy.

Q. Seemed awfully frustrated in that fifth set. Sort of hitting yourself with the racquet. Do you feel mentally like you were letting the match get away from you by that point?
TOMMY HAAS: Not really. I mean, I think in the fifth set, for me, it was probably more physically than anything. Uhm, you know, my body didn't feel as good anymore. Couldn't really do the small steps to stand well to the balls. Was making too many unforced errors that way, couldn't cover the court as well as I did the first three, four sets.
You know, you start thinking a little bit too much. Breakpoint, obviously in the fourth set that I had, I don't know if I had two even, but one I didn't make him play and, you know, that's frustrating.

Q. You had said yesterday you described him as a Russian tennis machine. I mean, is that what it felt like out there? Did he just seem like a machine out there?
TOMMY HAAS: Yeah, well, he's not gonna go away, obviously. You know, he doesn't weight much, he doesn't have to carry too much around the courts. Got to give it up, he plays a solid game. Very aggressive. Covers the court well. And, you know, it's tough to beat him.
I thought I had the right strategy, I thought I played the right way to beat him. A few points here and there, just wasn't enough, unfortunately.

Q. How do you look at the big picture? You got to the quarterfinals here, take him to a fifth set. Is it disappointing? Do you take positives out of it?
TOMMY HAAS: Well, any time you make it to a quarters, I mean, obviously, you have to take something positive out of it.
So that's obviously, you know, a nice, you know, victory, I guess, after all.
But it's also tough. It's gonna take a few days for sure to get over this loss. You know, the possibility of getting to the semis here at the US Open, uhm, it's yeah, it's never easy. But, you know, I laid it out there, you know, as much as I could, fought till the last and even had two breakpoints to get back to 5 All. You never know what would have happened then.
That's tennis, though.

Q. Was it a matter of just too many five set matches catching up to you at some point?
TOMMY HAAS: Maybe a little bit, you know. You can't really do anything about Mother Nature. Obviously, if it would have gone the right way, who knows what would have happened.
But, you know, I got a little bit lucky as well maybe to get to the quarters in the first place, winning two fifth set tiebreaks. So what can you do?
You know, like I said, I started feeling it a little bit in the end. My legs didn't really they started to give out a little bit. That's probably because I played a long match yesterday. But that's part of it and you have to deal with it and accept it.

Q. Having won those two five setters previously, you must be pretty confident coming into the fifth set today?
TOMMY HAAS: Yeah, I was. Unfortunately, I just didn't feel that my body was there. You know, mentally, I felt pretty good throughout the whole time, even though I had chances in the fourth to maybe go up a break at 3 2. That still hurt a little bit.
You know, he broke me right away. I broke him back. I thought that, you know, I had the right game plan even though I didn't feel good physically anymore. But he made another break, and then, yeah, went up a double break. So that was kind of tough, even though I had the chance, like I said, to make it back to 5 All, which would have been nice.
But, that's it. You win some close ones and you lose some close ones.

Q. You called the trainer in the middle of the fifth set. What was that about?
TOMMY HAAS: Why I called the trainer?

Q. Yeah.
TOMMY HAAS: Well, once my feet were killing me, and the others, I started to cramp up there. After the game at 5 2 I was trying to stretch my leg, but I felt it kind of locking up. Just at the stage where, you know, if it really locks up, I'm done. So I know that, you know, you have the chance now, these days, uhm, to call injury time out for cramping, and it's the only way I could have finished the match, to do that.

Q. You've been through a lot in your career. No. 2 in the world. Lot of bad injuries. Now you've come back towards the top of the game. Do you think that your best tennis is still ahead of you?
TOMMY HAAS: I don't know. We'll see about that. I mean, I would like to think so, you know. Obviously, I'm not getting any younger. I'm going into the 30s now. So there's times where I play unbelievable tennis, where I think I haven't played that well before in my life. But, you know, I've also played some great tennis three, four, five years ago.
I think you have to take it week by week, tournament by tournament. Still, I'm trying to improve.
But I think the tennis is getting better from everybody year by year.

Q. You're going to stay a couple of days here? What's your calendar look like for the rest of the year?
TOMMY HAAS: Uhm, I'm not sure yet what my plan is, if I stay here obviously, till tomorrow for sure. Then we'll see what happens. Next is Davis Cup in Germany. Then probably start off, I think, in Vienna, so...

Q. You played two Russians back to back in this tournament. Very different styles of play. Very different on court demeanors. Can you compare them at all? Can you tell they came out of the same system?
TOMMY HAAS: Same. They play both tough game. Obviously, I think Safin has even more powerful strokes, to be honest. I think he hits it as hard as anybody out there. I think Davydenko moves a little better. Obviously, he's smaller and doesn't weigh as much as Safin.
You know, it's like a machine, like a ball machine. Gets every ball back. He doesn't really miss much. When he gets into a groove, he finds a lot of corners and makes the opponent run. That's his game and that's working for him.

Q. Making a leap here, but how would he fare against Roger Federer?
TOMMY HAAS: How would what?

Q. How would he fare against Federer?
TOMMY HAAS: Davydenko, I think he's never beaten him. Roger has the right game and the movement to do whatever he wants, if he gets to the semis past Blake today. He can mix up the game as much as he wants. I thought I did that actually the first two sets really well. Just couldn't maintain it, unfortunately.

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