ROLAND GARROS

May 30, 2026

Matteo Berrettini

Press Conference

M. BERRETTINI/F. Comesana

7-6, 5-7, 6-7, 6-4, 7-6

THE MODERATOR: Matteo, well done. Just tell us what you think made the difference in the end in this epic battle.

MATTEO BERRETTINI: I don't know. Maybe the fact that I didn't play this tournament for five years, and I just wanted to enjoy one more match. But obviously when it's so tight, it's tough, match points on one side, match points on the other side. Just a matter of nerves, and sometimes a little bit of luck, I think it's needed.

I don't know. Normally I remember everything, and now I'm struggling to remember a little bit what happened, and I just remember a few points. But I'm so glad I finished the match, I feel good physically, mentally. I fought every single point from the beginning till the end.

I'm really happy.

THE MODERATOR: Questions in English.

Q. How important is your serve in general, and how important was your serve today in this game?

MATTEO BERRETTINI: My serve is obviously the base of my game, but at the same time, I think we have seen in the past, even with great servers, and I can talk about myself, that when mentally you're not in the game and you're not 100%, doesn't matter really which kind of weapons do you have, because they're gonna let you down a little bit, you know, in important moments.

I think today my serve worked well in important moments, and that's the proof of the fact that I was there. I was there mentally. I was tough. I was resilient.

Obviously one thing is having a weapon; one thing is knowing how to use it.

Q. You spoke about the nerves and it being tight. Can you express how that manifests in your body, what it feels like, the symptoms? Not necessarily the effect on your tennis but the effect on your body.

MATTEO BERRETTINI: I mean, in general, I have been feeling this since I started playing tennis. It's just the heartbeat goes up. It's tougher to breathe. You know, you're going a little bit like that.

But it's part of what we do. Like, we are running and chasing balls for five hours under the sun. It's normal to feel like that. Actually, you know, it's important to try to relax as much as possible and to breathe a little bit slowly.

It does happen that, you know, sometimes every player gets, when they get tight, you just tend to play with your strength instead of your whole body, you know, like you just get tight and you try to win the points with your arm and not with your whole body.

I think that's so normal, you know. This, I remember, I missed the forehand 12-all. I wasn't attacking for him. It was just to build the point up.

I just missed it because, you know, you're nervous, and maybe just a centimeter difference can make the difference, and I shanked it, but it's part of what we do.

Q. You have obviously been in a lot of late rounds of majors before, even if it's been a while for you. How much do you sort of feel comfortable in this stage getting into the middle part and hopefully the end part for yourself at this major? Because there are a lot of guys in the draw who don't have very much experience as you have. How much do you think that could help the rest of your way here?

MATTEO BERRETTINI: I mean, definitely can help. I know what it takes to go deep in a slam, but at the same time, it's also true that, like you said, I haven't been deep in a slam for a long time. So I think like in life, it's important to find the balance.

Of course I don't have, coming into the tournament, I didn't have the confidence, you know, like I had a couple of years ago, but at the same time, I feel like I built this confidence up.

So I feel confident and, you know, I'm in the fourth round, second week of Paris, means that I can go deep. I'm playing well. Today was, I think, a high-level match. My weapons are working, physically I'm there, and, you know, fingers crossed.

Q. You were very emotional after the match point. Curious if you want to share what was coming to your mind at this point? Flashbacks? What was going on?

MATTEO BERRETTINI: So many things, but maybe the best one was the fact that I doubt about myself a little bit too much, I think, in the last months and years. Probably even though I had unbelievable support from my family, from my friends, from my team, and everybody kept telling me that I still had it in me, sometimes I just have to confess that, you know, I thought that I couldn't come back, I couldn't feel good on court again.

And that's why I basically was emotional, because I proved to myself one more time that I can do this, I can do it well, I can fight, I can enjoy my time on court. That's why.

Q. Precisely when did you start to feel again that you could practice like you wanted, compete like you wanted, that you could become a regular competitor again?

MATTEO BERRETTINI: It's like I was saying, if you follow a little bit, like after I came back from last summer, I would say, I always said that this sport needs some time. It needs some momentum and some confidence that you build throughout the matches, the practices, and everything.

You know, I felt for so many times that the body was there, but the mind wasn't there, and then the mind was there and the body wasn't. That's tough. It takes a lot of things in order to play your best tennis, in order to compete in that way.

Yeah, so I felt like actually pretty good, you know, like also the end of last year when I played the Davis Cup, I was feeling really good physically. At the beginning of the year, I did a really good preseason. It was unfortunate I felt my ab again in Australia.

Then you start the season with a little bit of doubts, again, is it going to hold up. I worked really hard in order to get out of that mentality. I just now trust my body, and I think all these matches that I played this year, challengers or 1000 or whatever, just gave me and brought me here, gave me the confidence to achieve this result.