ROLAND GARROS

May 24, 2026

Alejandro Davidovich Fokina

Press Conference

A. DAVIDOVICH FOKINA/D. Dzumhur

6-7, 6-3, 2-6, 7-5, 6-3

THE MODERATOR: Well done, Alejandro. Can you please assess your performance today and talk us through the match?

ALEJANDRO DAVIDOVICH FOKINA: Well, today was a very tough match. I didn't expect that it was going to be that hot today. Yeah, I suffer a lot with this heat. Since the beginning, I was not feeling very good.

Yeah, in the middle of the game I needed to change a little bit my plans, because physically I was struggling today a little bit. Yeah, at the end, I was a little bit lucky playing two, three shots. Today I make a lot of winners.

Yeah, grateful, because you don't know when after these matches you don't know what is coming next. So now I have two days to recover, good my body, and it's going to be on Wednesday, like, the first one. I'm going to feel like 100%.

So that's why I was pushing a little bit in the fifth set that I just need to push a little bit harder and, yeah, to think that I'm going to make it.

THE MODERATOR: Questions.

Q. Can you tell us a bit what changed in the game when you play with that weather, if the ball is changing, if there is something that changed on the game besides just being really hot?

ALEJANDRO DAVIDOVICH FOKINA: No, not really. Just because I was not feeling good today. My body was not feeling good, and I needed to accept that today the conditions are very hot and that I'm not feeling the best.

So in the middle of the second set I needed to change a little bit -- well, a little bit of my game. I know that he's very solid from the baseline, and I needed to hit three, four shots maximum, because I was not feeling, as I said, very good.

But I'm happy now that I could make it. I was feeling a little bit sorry from him, because he was fighting out there for hours. Me, I was, like, focusing on other things, so on my planning of my game.

Q. Any worry before the first round? I mean, you're not injured. It was just the conditions today?

ALEJANDRO DAVIDOVICH FOKINA: Yes, at the end I am coming from Hamburg with 10 degrees, and I didn't have the chance, no, to adapt with this condition. At the end, it's 22 degrees more, and with this kind of player, no, that is very solid, very solid, and make you play everything.

But, as I said, I accepted and just change my game to play harder. Yeah, like I said, I wasn't feeling good, and that's the thing, no, just accept it and keep pushing yourself.

I was thinking to go away, but I was, like, it's first round, I don't want it, and let's see what happened. You know, maybe he start cramping or whatever. So the thing I didn't give up and just pushing until the end.