U.S. OPEN

August 26, 1996

Jason Stoltenberg

JASON STOLTENBERG: It could have been better. But, you know, it's the first round, so it's always nice just to get through that one. I was playing a player today that was pretty tricky; tough to get into a rhythm. I guess I'm through to the next round, which is the most important thing.

JASON STOLTENBERG: A bit of both. He's the type of player that you don't know what to expect. He can hit a lot of winners, make a lot of errors. I was just trying to hang in there. I was down a second set, he was missing a bit, picked my game up. It was gusty as well. I was playing on the courts where there's one court next to the other; quite distracting sometimes.

JASON STOLTENBERG: I would have liked to have served better. My serve let me down at times, but it was patchy. I had some good serves when I needed them at times, and I didn't at other times. I had a lapse in the second set, down two breaks at the start of the second set. Other than that, I was pretty happy with the way things went. Overall, I played quite well. You have to to beat a guy like that in straight sets.

JASON STOLTENBERG: Well, it's a similar situation to Wimbledon. I wasn't -- I hadn't really done that well at Wimbledon before the third round. Started playing well. Same here. I will have to do well here to make quarterfinal or go further. Whether it's this year, I don't know. I'm a long way away from it at this stage. Getting through the first round, which is quite often the toughest one to get through, once you get on your way, you relax, play a little better. Hopefully my next match I'll relax a little bit and be able to play my game a little more. Today I was a little nervous, a little tentative. Hopefully next round I can get out a little more, taking one at a time. Not looking past my next one.

JASON STOLTENBERG: I think maybe he may have been feeling the heat a little bit, I'm not sure. He did seem -- I think the second set, being down two breaks, I came back and won that set. That sort of deflated him a little bit. He started to hit out and make a lot of mistakes. With me winning that second set, my game picked up as well. The third set wasn't as hard of work as the first two sets, obviously.

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