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ROLAND GARROSMay 25, 2014Sam QuerreyPARIS, FRANCE S. QUERREY/F. Volandri THE MODERATOR: Questions, please. Q. Feel good to get a win under your belt at a slam? SAM QUERREY: Yeah. Q. Not being a guy who likes clay lot, too, so how did you feel out there? SAM QUERREY: I feel great. Not everyone likes to play on Sundays. If you do lose, you feel like you're out the tournament before it even starts. But it's kind of the opposite. It's nice to win on Sunday too and have a couple days off. I felt great. Felt my serve was ‑‑ couldn't hit my serve much better and my forehand felt good. Overall it was good. I think in the next match I will have to execute a little more and be a little sharper. Definitely a great win against a clay‑court player. Q. How is your injury in Houston and the recovery? SAM QUERREY: That was fine. It was a good four, five days later. It was kind of like waking up with a stiff neck, was like waking up with a stiff back. It's fine now. It was something that was there for three or four days, but it's fine now. Q. What were the expectations coming in here after the spring? SAM QUERREY: I didn't really have any. I didn't really set a goal in mind with winning matches or anything. I just kind of wanted to come over and play well. Just going to do one match at a time, and I'm excited to get one win. Feel like I played well. Hopefully I can win again and see where it's at. Q. John said a minute ago about he thought you were punching well below your weight here. So do you feel the same way, and what do you need to do to get things clicking again? SAM QUERREY: Yeah. I'm ranked 65 or so. I think I'm a really good 65 in the world. I think I just‑‑ yeah, kind of like you said: I think every match you win you get a little more confidence. You know, I'll go one match at a time and hopefully win another, and then get into the U.S. ‑‑ or to the grass, which I like, and the U.S. summer, which I like, and hopefully I can keep winning matches and keep gaining confidence and my ranking will go up. Q. With your experience now, how do you handle looking at the ranking? You know what you've been and could be, and then there is that number. How do you approach it? SAM QUERREY: You know, you think about that every now and then. I've been ranked between 50, 60, 70 for a few months. I don't think about it now. I just think about trying to go out there and win matches playing the right way and playing aggressive. You know, wherever I'm ranked, I'm ranked. I think you think about it a little more when you're younger actually. When you are younger, if you made a third round of a French Open, that next year back it's kind of on your mind. Now that this is my eighth time playing it, I just trying to go out there and play well. Ranking is what it is. I don't think about it too much. Q. So this may sound like an obvious question, but you've played some pretty close matches this year that you've lost this year. Closing it out, crunch time, is that a confidence thing or is there anything else you look back on that might have undermined you? SAM QUERREY: No, it's a confidence thing. I think in those matches this year I've made the wrong decisions or been a little tentative and just not had the confidence to go for my forehand and my serve and the shots that have won me matches in the past. But each one that I can kind of sneak by and win, you get a little more confidence. Hopefully then those close ones will turn. Q. There are a lot of changes on the horizon for player development centers in America. You spent I believe some time at Carson. Talk about the facility there. Did you play a lot of matches or was it sort of one off or just talk about that. SAM QUERREY: Yeah, up until this year when David Nainkin left the USTA to become my full‑time coach, the previous five years pretty much practiced st Carson when I was home. It was great. The courts are great; the gym is great. There is a handful of players in L.A., especially right now with‑‑ I was practicing there with Steve Johnson. Jack Sock just moved, but he was there for the past few years. You've got a lot of colleges there. So it's a great facility and the courts and the gym are great. Q. So it's a net plus? SAM QUERREY: Yeah. I mean, don't really practice there too much anymore, but I hope for tennis in Southern California it stays open. Q. Talk about your movement and footwork in particular as a big guy, how important that is and how you've worked on your footwork. SAM QUERREY: In general or how it pertains to the clay? Q. In general. SAM QUERREY: You know, I don't work on it too much. It's something that comes pretty natural to me. I do ladder and footwork drills and a lot of running. As far as like footwork and moving around, it's something that comes natural. I feel like I can do it pretty well without having to do specific drills for it. Q. You were American No. 1 I think about a year ago, give or take. What was that experience like for you looking back? Was it tough shouldering the burden of it more than you expected or less? SAM QUERREY: No, it was just cool that when I'm done playing I can say I was the No. 1 American in our country at one point. It wasn't tough. I didn't feel any pressure. It wasn't a burden. The only thing it was positive and exciting. Q. What's your reaction to Rafa being on Lenglen tomorrow to kickoff the tournament? SAM QUERREY: Didn't see that, but‑‑ I, sure Lenglen and Chatrier, they're both big courts. They're both so similar. No big deal to me. Australian Open, Wimbledon, and this one, they kind of have two giant courts each. You see the best players kind of flip‑flop back and forth, but doesn't affect me. I don't really care, and I doubt he cares, too. Q. In the first set you faced a few break points and you saved them almost exclusively with big serves and you served very well throughout the match. You didn't seem to be afraid to come into the net when you had some short balls. In the past, was there a hesitation on your part to come to the net on short balls? SAM QUERREY: Yeah, just kind of ‑‑ I don't really play the surface. I play my game. If I hit a big serve and get a short ball, I'm going to hit and come in on any surface. That's just what I'm trying to do and that's my game plan. So doesn't matter the surface. Q. I don't know how much you've heard about the new center that the USTA is planning in Orlando, but I guess it's going to be one of the largest facilities anywhere. Hundred courts. Everything but grass. They are hoping to attract talented juniors and top pros to come down there and utilize the facilities. Comments or thoughts on that? SAM QUERREY: Yeah, I saw I guess a computer image of it and looked impressive. It looked great. I think it'll be great for U.S. tennis to have so many courts, you know, clay, hard, and the indoor, and have one giant facility where I am assuming kids will come and they will board kids, you know, they can come and stay there. So hopefully it'll help. It can't hurt. It's great to see that the USTA is building something and trying to make kind of a giant mega center more like the other countries I feel like are doing. Kind of like they have in Australia and how the LTA has that one giant center. So I think it'll be good. Q. After working with David when he was in the USTA, what is your take overall on the development program and how they've done? SAM QUERREY: I think they've done a great job. I loved my time there. I think all the coaches, they have a group phenomenal coaches and phenomenal trainers. I think they work hard and do all the right things. I think they're really passionate and trying their best to make champions to and produce great players. You know, I think just got to keep going. I think they do a great job. Q. I knew you worked with David, but did Higueras ever come by and talk to you or help out at all? SAM QUERREY: Yeah, often. If I was in L.A. he would pop down. He was always at the US Open, at Indian Wells, and he would come watch matches and give his opinion. So he was very‑‑ you know, I heard from him a lot and got a lot of information from him. Q. His best strength as a coach was? SAM QUERREY: I don't know, what he said. I can't put one thing on it. Q. I think the prevailing opinion now is not to have that many kids boarding there, but to have them come through with their own coaches and stuff. Thoughts on that concept? SAM QUERREY: I think that's good. Everyone is different. As a kid, just do whatever you need to do to be the best player. Whether that's living somewhere or having your own coach or home school or normal high school, just whatever makes you play the best and feel the best, I think that's what you should do. Q. Do you think in general Americans should be satisfied with where the pro men's level is right now overall for the U.S. guys? SAM QUERREY: Yeah. I mean, I think all the guys work hard and do the right things. You know, we all want to be ranked as high as we can. I'm sure the fans were kind of spoiled there in the '90s when we had an American winning almost every Grand Slam, but I think they should just appreciate the hard work everyone does and how hard everyone tries. The results are the results. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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