AUSTRALIAN OPEN
Date: 2005-01-15

AUSTRALIAN OPEN

January 15, 2005

Svetlana Kuznetsova
MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA
The Moderator Questions for Svetlana, please.

Question How are you doing? How is your shape doing before this Australian Open?
Svetlana Kuznetsova I'm feel pretty comfortable. I feel very good. And I'm looking forward to play this tournament. But, of course, it's going to be more difficult because it's first tournament of the year and still you need to get (inaudible) in the matches.

Question The Russians really dominated last year. It was also a big surprise. Seven players in the Top 15. How do you see this year? Will it become more difficult for you? Everybody knows you now.
Svetlana Kuznetsova Well, I think they also knew us before. You know, we were still up, but not so high. We were all the time there. We were doing like semifinals, quarterfinals. And last year it was like a change, quick change, so we start winning. And the players, they will prepare better for our matches. This is definitely. And I hope we keep doing the same way. But definitely everybody of us going to have more pressure because we already did something good and we have to keep going, and people expect from us. But I still think everybody's enjoying. This is the most important thing.

Question Do you as a Grand Slam winner feel more pressure already?
Svetlana Kuznetsova Me, no. I feel pretty comfortable. I feel good. I feel that I already did something, so I think it's even take some pressure off me. And I'm come here, I want just enjoy here, play good tennis. I like to be in Australia. I like Melbourne. I feel the people very nice here. I really like this surface. Maybe it's a bit slow, but I enjoy playing hard court, so...

Question Do you think there was a reason why the Russian women all started winning last year? Had something changed?
Svetlana Kuznetsova I think the players are all the time getting closer and closer, you know. So it was only maybe Kournikova before. Lots of people were looking on her and they start doing good thing. After Anastasia and Elena came. After younger players get closer, you know. So it's grow to be competition between Russian players, and competition made us grow. So to be so competitive, we start winning. So this is my point, why we are doing so well.

Question Do you think it will be another Russian woman that will win here in Melbourne?
Svetlana Kuznetsova You never know. Hope so.

Question Who do you think will be the other big threats?
Svetlana Kuznetsova I think Alicia, she's playing really good tennis now. And she's comfortable here. She has maybe a little bit pressure and she is at home. Lindsay's playing well. I mean, it's so hard to say in the start of the year because you never know who gets a better shape in here. Like maybe in Roland Garros or Wimbledon, is going to be easier to say who is in better shape. But now you don't know anything because everybody getting injured and stuff. Many players now can do it, and I think it's really open.

Question Have you set any goals for yourself this year?
Svetlana Kuznetsova I'm not like thinking about goals so much. You know, my most important thing is to improve myself every day, you know. Every time I go on the court I want to do better and enjoy it as much as I can. Of course, I wish to keep growing level and ranking. But if I want to improve my game, I will grow in ranking for sure. My goal is just to be in the same spot or just to go better. Of course, I wish to be No. 1. Of course it's so clear, otherwise I wouldn't be here. But you never know when it's going to come to you and if it's going to come. So I'm working hard and I'm really enjoying doing this thing.

Question How badly will the Belgian girls be missed here in Australia? They were the finalists last year.
Svetlana Kuznetsova It's really bad for tennis. But I hope and I wish them to recover faster. But it will be more interesting in tennis, you know. I think for tennis, it's so important that all good players playing all in one time, you know, so people can watch better tennis and we can compete to better players. And it's going to be little bit hard to them to go back because they didn't play for so long. But hopefully they going to be back again and we going to start to compete again.

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