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BRISBANE INTERNATIONAL


January 6, 2019


Marcus Daniell

Wesley Koolhof


Brisbane, Queensland, Australia

M. DANIEL, W. KOOLHOF/R. Ram, J. Salisbury

6-4, 7-6

THE MODERATOR: First question for the doubles champions.

Q. Did you bring champagne?
WESLEY KOOLHOF: That's the most important question.

THE MODERATOR: Next time. They have a tournament next week. We're professionals, the ATP Tour.

Q. You guys obviously you've won doubles titles yourselves, I think three of them each before, but what was the key this week for coming through for your first together?
WESLEY KOOLHOF: That's a good question. Um --

MARCUS DANIELL: I'll take that one. So we had -- we started together on the grass last year, and we had some good results. We had some bad results. There wasn't quite enough consistency, and we had a really big deep chat at the end of the year about what we needed to work on individually and as a team to be a competitor for the Top 8 at the end of 2019, and I think we both went away and put a lot of time and effort into those things, and I think it's paying off. The feeling that we've had from the first practice here this week has been great, and just built on it match after match, and it's about as good of start as you could ask for for the year and we're just going to keep building on it.

Q. You guys got to play the role of spoilers against the Aussies the other day inside that court but the atmosphere just in general, really great. Nearly full for most of your match. What was that like?
WESLEY KOOLHOF: Yeah, good. The atmosphere was incredible. Even though we played Aussies and probably they will cheer for them, of course. But I mean we got some support as well, I think. It was a great match to watch.

Q. Today, too. Right?
WESLEY KOOLHOF: Today as well, yeah. That took over two hours, I think. Doesn't really happen that often.

MARCUS DANIELL: They're actually pretty fair, the Aussie crowd. Obviously they're behind the Aussies, but if we played a great point, there was some noise for that, which is more than you can ask for really. It's pretty special.

WESLEY KOOLHOF: It is. It's a big crowd, big court, and to be able to play two matches on centre court in a row, for doubles, it's not that common. So I think, yeah, thumbs up to the tournament director and to the tour manager for putting some doubles here on centre court.

Q. How does this set you guys up for the rest of the year post that deep chat that you had in the off season and what you expect to achieve on the court in 2019?
WESLEY KOOLHOF: I think, yeah, like Marcus said, we started this year, and even on the practice court, gave it everything. Had some chats before every practice what to work on and everything. I think we're going to just keep doing that and build on that, and I mean we've played four very good high-level matches. Every practice is high level as well. So just keep going like this. And, yeah, also when things are not going that well, just talk to each other and get it over with. Let's go for more titles, yeah.

MARCUS DANIELL: I think if we keep doing the things that we've agreed on the way that we've done this week, then there's no reason not to win many more titles this year. There's no reason not to be in London at the end of the year, and that's obviously the goal for every doubles team, but we've shown this week that we can be consistent with our level, and if you do that enough weeks, then you're going to get there.

Q. And I'm assuming Auckland next or you go to Sydney?
MARCUS DANIELL: Definitely Auckland. It's the one chance I have to play at home. Yeah, so we are flying out early tomorrow morning. So, yeah, we're going to have to go easy on the champagne, I think, because we're going to be waking up about 6. So, yeah, not too much champagne. Just like one bottle will be fine.

Q. It's 5:30. You're fine. You can have a glass.
THE MODERATOR: Any more questions?

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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