ROLEX SHANGHAI MASTERS

October 6, 2025

Shang Juncheng

Press Conference

N. BORGES/Shang Juncheng

7-6, 4-6, 6-3

THE MODERATOR: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the press conference of Shang Juncheng. We will start with Chinese questions.

Q. I would like to ask you: In the course of the match, you touch your knees a couple of times, both hands, single hands. Is that your injury or stamina?

SHANG JUNCHENG: Generally, I feel dizzy, I feel hot. I've been playing for two night matches, maybe I'm not that used to a day match. I joked with my coach that I haven't seen the sun for a number of days, so this is the first time for me to see the sun or play.

I felt that at the beginning maybe I felt a bit rusty, but I broke serve first. Then, you know, the weather bothered me a little bit. I may have suffered from a bit of lack of oxygen. Not saying that I don't like this weather, I'm just not used to this kind of hot weather. After all, this is my first time, and generally speaking this is the first third round I've made it into and it's good.

Q. You really created a milestone in Shanghai Masters: Beating the world number 10, and for the first time entered into the round of 32. What are you most happy with your performance, and give us a bit of your general assessment of your performance so far.

SHANG JUNCHENG: Let me think about these three rounds. I think what I'm most happy about is the preparation. I feel that, especially in Beijing, after I came to Shanghai, I don't have a lot of time to prepare, just Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, three days. I felt that I was not well prepared. I'm not full of confidence. Generally I like a longer time to prepare for a tournament. Especially when the weather is different. Beijing is dry, it's completely different from here.

So before I started to play I had a lot of question marks. Then the first round gave me a lot of confidence. Second round, I beat world number 10, so very confident. I really played my tennis. Generally I'm happy with the preparation.

If I have to pick one that is most satisfying, I have to pick today, despite the result. I think there's some progress I've made. While I was lagging behind, I did not really get into the negative territory. Generally in the tennis I was a bit agitated at the net. I also had a bit of lucky balls. Sometimes, you know, good luck, bad luck, it happens. It's the same thing with your daily life.

So today it's just not a very smooth day, smooth working day. But that really taught me a lot, and I started to better understand my body and my way of playing.

Q. From Beijing and then Shanghai, very tough battles, but generally the way we look at you, you seem to be more resilient today than your performance in Beijing. You fought hard until the match point. Do you think that mentally you're stronger than before?

SHANG JUNCHENG: I think there are multiple factors at play. Sometimes you're not feeling too physically competent, so if you are a bit agitated it's sometimes reflected in your tennis, sometimes in your body. Your team and coaches, the spectators, the courts all have an impact on me. The key is that I need to channel my right energy into fighting for the next point, not anywhere else.

This is exactly what I want to show to everyone. I want to be a resilient player. If you do not beat me, I'm not going to give up simply. I think I kind of did that. I believe going forward, practice, training, matches, I'm always going to put my full strength.

Q. As you said earlier, you didn't give up. You lost the first set. Second set, third set you made many changes, like dropshot, like your net play, and your return was more flexible. Does that mean that you want to remind yourself that change of rhythm is important?

SHANG JUNCHENG: Like I said, I'm not a heavy server, I'm not that powerful server, so I think I want to work on some details. I think that two of my break serves ended with the opponent's double-faults. I think sometimes when I'm trying to give a return I need to stand a little more to the back court, a bit like a defensive player, like clay court players. I want to give myself more confidence to return.

I've had some tactical preparation for serve and return, and at the end of the day it's about the court play. The circumstances always dictate my play.

Q. Now your ranking is around 210. I'm curious, before the end of the season, how you're going to make plan for yourself, for your schedule.

SHANG JUNCHENG: Just a couple of days ago I just confirmed I'm going to play in Hong Kong's UTS. And then I'm going to play a Challenger. The National Games are coming. I don't think it's worth the detour to Europe, there is a chance of jet lag and others. I want to give it full focus and prepare for the National Games. I haven't really confirmed working on my ranking protection, it's something that I need to talk with my team about.

Q. In fact, the season in China is over. Can you just give us a little bit of your summary of your performance, especially you're in the recovery stage after injury.

SHANG JUNCHENG: Generally I can see that this season is not ideal. I didn't play that much. The past three weeks, the China season, I did have a good time. My game was good on court. I did learn a lot of things, like how do I plan my training after losing or after winning, how I'm going to do the training. I don't think the right way is to work without rest. I'm thinking about how to make sure that I'm always on an active stage physically.

If you pause for a day, it's very easy for you to get rusty. If you don't play, you need to do something that helps with your physical condition. I think I made some improvement. In Masters, you have one day off after competition, and in a Grand Slam as well. So how do I use that one-day break to adjust myself to the optimal stage. There are a lot of things I need to learn. I'm very happy in Shanghai, in my home crowd, I'm able to make it into the top 32 in the Masters. I hope there are more to come.