AUSTRALIAN OPEN

January 26, 2026

Jason Kubler

Marc Polmans

Press Conference

KUBLER-POLMANS/McCabe-Tu

6-4, 6-4

THE MODERATOR: Guys congratulations on today's win. Through to the quarterfinals of the men's doubles. Do you want to start by talking us through today's match?

MARC POLMANS: Me? Yeah, I think it was a good-quality match. I think playing against James and Li, they are great singles players, let alone doubles plays. I thought the tennis was quite good level. Thankfully Jason and I were able to get one break in each set, which was the deciding factor.

I mean, we'll find it tough to return James' serve so we had a few sniffs of breaks on Li's serve, but it was a nice day. Our previous match we played at night, so it was nice to be back playing during the day. The crowd was awesome, too. That's my thoughts, yep.

THE MODERATOR: Questions, please.

Q. Congratulations. You've got Doumbia and Reboul in the next round. Can you talk through what you're expecting from that match? You guys are the only Aussies left in the draw, so if you're expecting the crowd to be really behind you in the next match?

JASON KUBLER: I had watched a little bit of them when they played Thanasi and Kygs in Brisbane. And then I think just the general consensus about them is they're a tricky doubles team. It's probably not going to be like today. They're going to be, you know, all over the net, a lot of lobbing, a lot of formation play. So I think just getting ready for that sort of doubles. Not so much what happened today.

Then what was the other bit, sorry?

Q. You're the only Aussies in the draw, expecting the crowd support.

JASON KUBLER: First of all, that's pretty cool, to be the only men's double teams left in the tournament. That's always cool. It would be nice. If they do come out, it would be nice.

We love it when we get a big crowd, especially in our first round, all that energy on that court, and even the other night on Rod was super cool. It would be great if they do.

We will try and put on a good doubles, so hopefully they do come out.

Q. Jason, you're probably the only Aussie that has experience playing in Ecuador on clay. Have you any thoughts on the Davis Cup tie coming up, and have you had any chats with Lleyton? Because Thanasi is not going, have you had any chats about going?

JASON KUBLER: I had experience a lot time ago, and I think I did too well. But I do know that it is going to be a shock to the system. I think that's the one thing you can expect.

Probably the first couple of days is going to be you're in a situation where your forehands and backhands would be going a little longer than you expect. But with the team right now, yeah with Thanasi I guess being up in the air about it, you know, they're all great servers. So I think that's definitely going to be a good thing, and they're all great movers around the court.

So I think there's some good things we have, and then also there are going to be some things we have to get used to. So we're going to see how it all goes, I guess.

Q. Have you spoken to Lleyton about playing?

JASON KUBLER: A little bit. A little bit. You know, right now I'm thinking more about the doubles sort of. Once this is done, then we can think about, you know, who's going or if I can go or any sort of talks like that.

But yeah, it would be silly of me to start thinking about something when we're in the quarters now.

Q. Just wanted to know, obviously James and Li are an athletic, powerful duo. Wondering, how did you account for that today? Did you lean on your experience, or what was it there?

MARC POLMANS: Yeah, exactly. I think Li and James were definitely getting to a lot of shots we didn't expect today. They extended rallies very well, which I anticipated would happen.

But I think, you know, them playing doubles together for the first time, me and Jason playing doubles together for the first time, there's always a few things that might be not quite used to, and I think we did a good job of hitting through the center, and sometimes they weren't maybe expecting the ball through the center. So we targeted that a little bit.

But we just needed Li to give us a few chances on serve, because James was serving over 200-plus every time. So Jason and I, I thought, did a good job of taking a chance when that arose on Li's serve.

Q. I also wanted to know, like, obviously the heat and the sun and also the Air Force fly-over and 21-gun salute, did any of that impact your concentration, or were you fully locked in?

JASON KUBLER: Not really. When you're out on the big courts, a lot of the noise, for me anyway, just becomes noise. So like you finish the point, there's noise, and that happens over and over again. I actually didn't really hear it.

The only time I saw it was when all the smoke from the air planes, I guess. But other than that, there was one other time where James was looking at the screen. I'm, like, why are you looking at the screen? He was probably looking at the planes.

MARC POLMANS: Yeah, I saw the planes. That was pretty cool. It didn't distract me that much.

JASON KUBLER: What was the other bit?

Q. 21-gun salute.

MARC POLMANS: I didn't hear that.

JASON KUBLER: No, I didn't hear that. I just saw the planes.

Q. Is there any reason why you guys can't go all the way here?

MARC POLMANS: Well, mate, there's plenty of good teams still left. Lots of the second seeds are still in the draw, right. The French team we play now have been playing for years. So there's a lot of experienced teams still left. And saying that, Jason and I, we are going to back ourselves to keep getting through one match at a time. I think we're doing that well. So we'll look forward to tomorrow. We'll go after our shots and hope for the best.

JASON KUBLER: Yeah, and I think with doubles as well it's honestly one point here or there, you know.

So we got to do our best in the moment to go for it and play our way. But, yeah, that's probably the exciting thing about doubles, is you just don't know what's going to happen, you know. We just got to try and swing out of those moments and then hopefully it goes for us.

Q. Obviously your doubles rankings are now going to skyrocket a little bit. Jason, you've had that experience before and, Marc, I think you have as well. Does this change your focus at all in terms from being singles players, will you play more doubles events if you get into the bigger events in doubles?

MARC POLMANS: Well, I think that's a big bonus for Jason and I, our doubles rankings. Hopefully we'll get a bit higher up so we can play some bigger events because for the last couple of years I've been playing challengers. It's very tough to move up the rankings unless you win challengers. That's very tough to do.

So I think that's a cool-added bonus for Jason and I. I hope we can play some more doubles throughout the year and, hopefully, in some bigger events where there's more ranking points, more prize money.

So I think it's a good thing for Jason and I to go deep this week. It's going to hopefully help us for the rest of the season.