AUSTRALIAN OPEN

January 16, 2026

Alexander Zverev

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: Sascha, welcome back to Melbourne Park. Tell us how your preparations have been going this week.

ALEXANDER ZVEREV: Very good. I feel ready and happy to start the tournament after tomorrow.

THE MODERATOR: Questions.

Q. Many media attention and so on. Is there something you wish journalists will ask you more about? Is there a topic you would like to speak more about that perhaps you don't hear many questions? Especially now that you finish with the council?

ALEXANDER ZVEREV: With the council?

Q. Now that you finish.

ALEXANDER ZVEREV: I mean, I don't know. I didn't expect this question, to be honest.

I would like to talk less to the media, generally speaking, and have a more relaxed life (smiling).

Yeah, I don't know. I'm very happy to answer all of your questions always.

Q. I wanted to ask you about an off-the-court topic, and that is the prize money part, the share between the revenue and the amount of money that players have got. I believe you were in a meeting at Wimbledon with some of the slams about that.

ALEXANDER ZVEREV: Yeah.

Q. How do you feel that's progressing now? Where do you think that issue is at?

ALEXANDER ZVEREV: Yeah, I mean, I was in the council, the player council, for the last couple of years. Don't really feel like there's any progress, to be honest.

One of the reasons why maybe I also left, I feel like it's just a lot of talk, a lot of time invested into it, and not really any changes. But, again, that's to the higher powers of the tennis world. That's not my decision. That's not up to me. That's not up to players, to be honest.

Yeah, it sometimes does feel like the governing bodies don't really get along so well. It's very difficult to get them in one room and talk about what is good for the future of tennis really.

So yeah, maybe it's a question towards those guys more than towards players, because we are just bystanders. We're playing the matches. We're playing the tours. When we try to get into the politics, we don't really have that much of a voice in it. Most of the time it's a lot of investments from time-wise from our side but not a lot of results, which is sometime a bit upsetting.

Q. Do you feel that is what is representative of the players you speak to? Do a lot of people feel like that?

ALEXANDER ZVEREV: To be honest, we have those separate meetings and then we talk about it through players. We don't go around the locker room and it's a subject of an everyday thing, you know what I mean?

So yeah, when the players do talk about it, then yes, we feel like the structure should be different, but, again, that's a conversation that I've had, and I was very open to you guys about it last year. I think schedule is a big part of it. I think mandatory events is a big part of it and all that.

Yeah, I think the players, at least the top players, are all very aligned in that subject. But again, it's not a subject that we talk about every single day in the locker room.

We are here. We are trying to play tennis. We're trying to play the best tennis that we can. We're all trying to prepare ourselves to compete against each other, to kill each other on the court. That's our main focus. Everything else comes secondary to us.