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COUPE ROGERSAugust 11, 2013Robert BedardMONTREAL, QUEBEC THE MODERATOR: Questions, please. Q. How closely did you follow Milos Raonic's week and what do you think of what he's accomplished? ROBERT BÉDARD: I know him quite well because he lives right close to where I live. Some of my sons have played with him since he was 13. I follow his career quite closely. I don't think you can count on today as his best day. He's beaten these tough guys this week. This is not the way he would have beaten them. Rafa was just overbearing for him. Too much pressure on him right now. He's the one representative of Canada. Too rough for him. I think he needs to do this a few times and then you'll see better. Q. Do you still play? ROBERT BÉDARD: Three, four times a week. Q. You still compete? ROBERT BÉDARD: Yes. Q. You obviously were the last Canadian to have this spot in the finals. What was the difference when you played and what you saw today happening in this stadium? ROBERT BÉDARD: Well, how many thousand here today? Might have been 500 in my days. It's a bit different (laughter). It's almost a club thing when I used to play. Never in a big stadium. It was either at the cricket club, in Montréal here at the Mount Royal Tennis Club, but it's totally different. You can't compare. Q. Were you encouraged by the amount of people here today? ROBERT BÉDARD: Encouraged for tennis in general 'cause tennis has not been too well received in Canada for a number of years. It's on its way up right now. That's the beauty of this. Seeing this today is fantastic really. Q. Where was the '58 final, your final? ROBERT BÉDARD: It was in Vancouver on grass. The year before that was at the Monkland. Before that it doesn't count. It was mainly Canadians. After that, it was a number of Americans and foreigners. Q. In light of how much this tournament has grown in scope, what Milos faced today, television audience as well, social media, how much appreciation do you have for how far he's gotten and the difficulty of that within the context of Canadian tennis? ROBERT BÉDARD: I really can't give a good assessment because it's a different game. My days, we were totally amateurs. We didn't play for money. That's an extra pressure that he has. We didn't play with the same crowds. More pressure. People were expecting a whole bunch from him. He will deliver someday. He didn't do it today. That's all. Q. What do you think Milos needs to improve on to get from where he is now to from what we're seeing from the top players? ROBERT BÉDARD: Well, his main weakness ‑ I'm not a coach or anything like that, I'm an amateur like you ‑ his return of serve is his weakness, for sure. He relies too much on his serve. If I were his coach, I'm not close to that, I wouldn't let him serve for a while and just make him play and improve on the other shots that he has. One thing he might not be able to improve as much as he should, as much as Pospisil will, I'm not sure his mobility is that great. But that can improve also. Those are the things I think I would rely on. Today if he made a serve, he'd win a point. But there's more to it than that. I don't know what percentage of first serves. Q. 48%. ROBERT BÉDARD: You can't win with just a serve. Q. How do we get to the European's level? ROBERT BÉDARD: When I played, there were 30 or 50 great players of the world, that's all. Today there are 300, 400. The Eastern Europeans weren't part of it. It was Western Europeans, Americans, Australians. That's all it was. Even South America was not that strong either. Q. In your day it was part‑time, you played in the summer, and you were a hockey player and a full‑time teacher. ROBERT BÉDARD: It's a different story. I went on three tours in Europe, for instance. After two and a half months I wanted to come back. I played every week. It's a different thing. We didn't make any money. We played. We got expenses, that was about it. Now it's a career. It's a job. With us it was a pastime. That's the difference. Q. You spoke when you played there was no big prize money; you played because of the game. Do you think something gets lost in these tournaments when you have big prize money and corporate involvement?  Do you think something is lost? ROBERT BÉDARD: I think something is gained really. You gain because you have to be in better shape, which means that you work at that. You have a trainer and somebody who gives you massage regularly. You've got somebody who might even be a psychologist. I think it's a gain, an overall gain. There's nothing lost. If a person of my vintage played today, he'd have to change totally his whole approach. I think it's a better approach than ours. Q. What do you think the future of Canadian tennis is then? ROBERT BÉDARD: It seems to be on the rise. But as I mentioned to this gentleman here, it's quite a number of years before we're going to be worldwide, on equal footing with the top countries, for sure. THE MODERATOR: Questions in French. Q. Can you describe your memories of tennis in Canada? ROBERT BÉDARD: Well, we've waited a long time before we could have a Canadian player reaching a final here, and now we have two really good players. So now I can retire, I'm fine (smiling). I believe those two players are going to improve a lot more. Q. Are they going to be able to win the finals like you did? ROBERT BÉDARD: They must make some changes in their games. I'm thinking about the return of serve for Milos. That's definitely a weak point. I was surprised to see he was not able to return Nadal's serves. He needs to practice that. Today was not his best match. Q. Can you compare today and your time? ROBERT BÉDARD: It's night and day. We were amateurs. We didn't play for money. We played on what we called social courts. There were no stadiums like this one. There were fewer spectators. Tennis was at a lower level. Players were not under pressure so much as they are today. If a player lost, it was a personal thing. Now today, when a player loses, it's in the name of his country. Q. Could you describe for us what tennis in Canada will be two years from now when the men's tournament returns to Montréal? Will a Canadian be able to win the final? ROBERT BÉDARD: Two years from now is not long enough. We now have two players that have broken through, but we would need 12. Look at Spain and Argentina. They have many players. Because, as we say, one feeds off the other. That's the way it is. In Spain, there are many other good players than Nadal. So now we only have two players and we would need eight or nine. So it's going to be another nine years before a Canadian player can win here, in my opinion. Q. Do you believe Milos should have changed his strategy in the second set? ROBERT BÉDARD: I don't know if you noticed, but he didn't go to the net very often. When he did once or twice, Nadal passed him. In our times, we were going to the net all the time. But now coaching has improved a lot. We were still playing with wooden racquets. Also 20 years have passed since then. Q. What could Milos have done to have the possibility of beating Nadal? ROBERT BÉDARD: I don't know. But I can tell you Djokovic can beat him. Roger Federer is going to win a few still. I think the best chance of Roger is Wimbledon. Today Nadal played without pressure. Raonic is going to play a lot better in the future. Q. Are you still playing tournaments? ROBERT BÉDARD: I do. I play three or four times a week. I also play with my children. They beat me. Q. So how can we get those seven or eight players we need? ROBERT BÉDARD: Things have considerably improved with the two French coaches we have now. That made a difference. I believe nowadays young kids should start playing tennis at 10 years old. We used to start at 18. But the age between 11 and 12 is the golden age to start tennis. I believe nowadays tennis in Canada is well‑organized. Young players play a lot of tournaments. Agents will not make a difference. What counts is the number of players at the base. Q. Do you know Raonic personally? ROBERT BÉDARD: I didn't know him well. I believe he doesn't know me, although I saw him today and he said he knew about my career. But my sons used to play with him. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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