WESTERN & SOUTHERN FINANCIAL GROUP MASTERS
Date: 2006-08-16

WESTERN & SOUTHERN FINANCIAL GROUP MASTERS

August 16, 2006

Roger Federer
CINCINNATI, OHIO
The Moderator Questions, please, for Roger Federer.

Question Roger, how do you feel? You did toy with the idea of not coming, so you made a great effort to come. But how do you feel now?
Answer Uhm, I feel okay, you know. Not tired. Just disappointed that the match didn't go the way I wanted it to. Nothing really worked. It's kind of hard, you know. You just have to look at the stats and they show that I didn't play well. So it's just a pity from that standpoint.
But otherwise, I thought he played pretty well, you know. Got to give him credit, you know, for closing out the match when he had to, because he missed plenty of chances, you know. He should have closed me out way easier than 5 and 4, so I'm pretty happy with the score.

Question He said he didn't feel you were a hundred percent.
Answer Yeah, seven breaks is not a hundred percent.

Question What was he doing with your serve? How was he able to take advantage of it?
Answer I was just serving bad, you know. That's just the thing I'm mostly disappointed about, you know. Because with the serve, my opponent really has nothing to do with, you know, because I'm in control of how good I can serve. That's the only thing really I regret, you know. From the baseline, I couldn't hit one winner, so of course that I knew from coming into the match that was gonna be hard. That's the only time I have that feeling.
It's just really the serve, you know, that's disappointing. But I guess it happens once in a while.

Question Why were you considering maybe not coming here?
Answer Because the schedule is quite tough, you know, and I knew that my expectations were not to win the tournament here; they were to survive a few rounds. So that's why I'm not disappointed after this loss, you know. I expected kind of a result like this. I'm actually pretty happy I won a match here.

Question Is it better just to get some more work in than worry about if you're gonna win the tournament here or not?
Answer Well, I mean, you know, it's a big choice, you know. I don't want to disappoint the fans and the tournament and myself, and if I'm eager to play. But at the same time, you've got to be a bit realistic. Winning back-to-back Masters Series, 12 matches in 13 days, it's just basically something of the impossible. If they don't start changing, you know, giving maybe the seeds any byes, I don't see any point why players should play back-to-back Masters Series anymore.
That's the big problem I see about the Masters Series. But other than that, you know, I still won a match, and I could have won today but I was just not good enough.

Question If you're not necessarily expecting to win, what's the motivation?
Answer Yeah, I mean, you know, the challenge. You know, try to make it not happen, you know. Obviously, it's the obvious, you know, I put a lot on the line this week, you know. What's the point just, you know, ignoring it, avoiding it, being scared of losing those streaks? I don't care about them, you know. Now that they're over, maybe it's going to be a bit of a relief for everybody, you know, and I can move on from here.

Question Given your record the last three years, how many times do you go into a tournament thinking you might not win?
Answer Plenty. Plenty of times.

Question Are you surprised that you've won as much as you have?
Answer Oh, yeah. Kidding me (smiling)?

Question What's your program now? Have you thought about staying here?
Answer It's ten minutes, so...
I had a shower and put the shirt on, so that's what I've been worried about.

Question Is it almost going to help you a little bit for the Open to have a little extra time?
Answer No, I would have preferred to win (smiling).

Question Is the night/day part of the problem, or is it just --
Answer Possible. I think it's, again, as usual, the whole combination. I think he did well by returning my serve well, you know, not making any errors and hanging in there, making it hard for me to win points. Then my game, the day, the night, the back-to-back Masters Series, the whole thing, you know, I think is just too much today, so...

Question Don't get enough practice time? You came in, you didn't practice I guess until Tuesday.
Answer Yeah, no practice. If you consider 45-minute warm-up a practice, that's not for me a practice, so...

Question Did you feel that really affected you?
Answer Oh, yeah. Big time.

Question Tommy Haas was talking this morning, he was saying for him it was difficult to adapt to the ball, and it's faster here than in Toronto. When the balls get very fluffy, did you have time to adapt?
Answer Well, I mean, you know, I was practicing in Dubai for ten days on this kind of a court, you know, but then you go ten days on a different court and it feels like you've never played on a court like this. So it's just so hard, you know, to kind of understand how you need to serve, how you need to play your game and everything. So it just takes either -- if you have no practice time, I would think three matches at least, you know, to kind of get the feel for it. Otherwise, you need to have two, three days of practice, you know. I had none of them, so I'm not surprised I'm out of the door.

Question You had a one-hour practice yesterday, is that right?
Answer Well, 45 minutes, warm-up.

Question Then today nothing?
Answer Well, half an hour hit.

Question Are you at all disappointed? You seem pretty okay with this.
Answer I'm not disappointed.

Question Not disappointed?
Answer No, I'm not. There's no reason to be because I'm on an incredible run. You always expect, you know, a loss once in a while. So when it happens, why be disappointed, you know, if I win, I don't know, over 90% of my matches. I would love that the streaks go on and on and on, but, you know, once in a while it's also good you lose, you know. So it's happened here this week. I always draw a positive out of losses, you know, so we'll see what I got to do now the next few days. I'm really excited about the Open now. Try to defend my title there. I'm already very happy that I could win one of the two Masters Series and that I actually was able to play here, because that's something I considered from the start if I do well in Toronto, not to play here, and I still came here. I feel like it still was the right decision.

Question The way he played, do you see him winning this tournament?
Answer He could. I think he's playing well, you know. He's definitely got to still improve many things. He played a good match today. Youngsters play good on the day. If they play good for the entire week, that's the other question.

Question You seemed very frustrated on the court, hitting the ball out of the stadium. That doesn't seem normal for you.
Answer Well, I mean, if you lose your serve three times in a row, that's not much fun, you know. So try to get the act together, but is just disappointing, you know, more than anything else. There's no frustration there. Just so many chances, you know, to kind of make it easier for yourself. And every time, I was, you know, the back against the wall. Just not so much fun to play this way, you know, being down all the time. If I could have been up, you know. It's different if he just closes me out 6-2, but I always had the feeling I had a chance. So I was just too bad, you know, to take advantage of it.

Question The calendar may not be changing any time soon. If this tournament follows the tournament in Canada every year, do you feel like most years you'll usually come to this second week in the row?
Answer Well, depends a lot on how you play the first week. I missed Montreal I think twice already - or three times - because of injuries, because of, you know, injuries and because of other things. But I didn't play Canada last year, and it made me win Cincinnati. This year I played Toronto, didn't make me win Cincinnati. So it's one or the other, I guess.

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