Alex De Minaur’s press conference at Wimbledon on Thursday was postponed half an hour at a time. Why was the Australian not in the conference room when a couple of hours had already passed since he beat Jaume Munar in the second round? Easy, because he was on Court 1 watching the match between his partner, Katie Boulter, who was finally eliminated by her compatriot Harriet Dart. With bittersweet emotion due to conflicting feelings, the world No. 9 made clear his love for grass and his desire to achieve a great result here.
Victory over Munar
“I’m happy, I feel good, I had a great performance today from start to finish, although it got a bit tougher at the end when it was time to close things out. But yes, I’m happy with my level, I played well.”
Complications in the third set
“It’s never easy to close out a match, you can always have those moments of bad luck, moments where you could have done better to close it out. When the match gets complicated and difficult, the important thing is to get back on serve. I was reminded of the match I had with Medvedev in Paris-Bercy, that was somewhat similar, although I don’t remember exactly, but I think my first match point was lost and then I messed up. The biggest difference is that I know that I can have a bad game when I served for the match, but that it’s not the end of it. If I have lost it, I know that I can start again in the fourth. This is the kind of mentality I like to have, to always recover as quickly as possible.”
Motivated with grass
“What’s really driving me at Wimbledon is that I need to have a great result here on grass because I don’t want to be labelled as a clay-court specialist (laughs). So I’m putting a lot of pressure on myself, just trying to keep going. I hope to leave here with a great result and for that clay-court specialist label to be thrown out of the window as soon as possible.”
In love with the surface
“For me, grass has always been a much more natural surface, I always enjoyed it throughout my career, from a young age. From the first time I stepped on it I was convinced that I was going to love it. Year after year I have been thinking that grass could be my best surface, but I can’t confirm it because the grass tour is too limited in the calendar, so I don’t know. But yes, I love playing here, it’s a moment that I look forward to every year.”
Derrota by Katie Boulter
“It’s been a huge disappointment, absolutely, but that’s tennis. You have your good days, then you have your bad days and then everything else. I know it’s going to be tough to handle at the end of the day, losing always hurts, that’s the reality. It doesn’t matter if you lose in the first round or if you lose in the final, or if you lose on any tournament day, it’s never easy. The most important thing for her is that this match doesn’t define her in any way, shape or form. I’m very proud of what she’s done, what she’s achieved throughout the grass-court swing, so I’m sure she’ll pull through.”
What do you do on your days off?
“Over the years I’ve been spending more and more time here in London, I’ve gotten to know this place quite well. There are different corners and places that we still enjoy, anything to get away from tennis, that’s always the main goal. This time, we’ll probably stay away from Wimbledon, we don’t really want to be here, not even in the village. We love the village, but during these days it’s crazy. Anything outside the village that makes us forget about tennis and go back to being normal human beings will be what we’ll look for.”
2024-07-04 16:18:36
#Grass #surface
