THE CHAMPIONSHIPS

July 3, 2026

Naomi Osaka

Press Conference

N. OSAKA/D. Kasatkina

6-1, 6-3

THE MODERATOR: Naomi, another good victory. How are you feeling?

NAOMI OSAKA: Yeah, I mean, I feel pretty good. I'm really happy to be able to be in the second week. Yeah, positive vibes.

THE MODERATOR: Questions, please.

Q. This is your first grass season with Tomasz. How has it been working with him?

NAOMI OSAKA: Yeah, I mean, I would say it's going pretty well. I would say he challenges me a lot to think outside the box. Even like coming into this grass season, we were doing a lot of things on the hard court because where I train, they don't have a grass court. We were just doing a lot of different things.

It's kind of made me, like, understand grass court tennis a lot more. I think when I was younger, I was a little bit more stubborn on how I wanted to play on this surface, but I realize it's a lot more free-flowing.

Q. It seems like there's been so much attention on your outfits, a lot less attention on the actual tennis you're playing. How do you experience that? I know there probably would be some players and some athletes who would be like, How come all you're asking about is my clothes rather than the game I'm playing? What is your reaction to all of that? Maybe you much prefer to talk about that side of it.

NAOMI OSAKA: Uhm... Yeah, you're right, I would actually prefer to talk about my clothes.

It's kind of weird. In some ways I feel like I'm a lot more equipped to talk about my clothes than to talk about my tennis. It's strange, because I've been playing tennis for 20-something years. Some days I don't feel like an expert on it.

If we were to talk about my outfit, I feel like I could keep going on and on and on. I find it really fun that people care and people are doing these deep dives into the fabric and the making-of stories.

So yeah, I don't mind.

Q. Do you find it to be a better way of expressing yourself, the art of design rather than the art of tennis?

NAOMI OSAKA: I mean, from my end, those two kind of go hand in hand. Obviously the longer I'm in the tournament, the more stories I can tell with my outfits anyways because I like to mix and match.

Yeah, I wouldn't say there's one above the other. Even tennis-wise, I feel really good right now. Like, I feel pretty confident. I feel like I'm playing really well.

I think on my end, like, there's only so many tennis questions you can answer, you know? It's kind of like the clothing questions are endless a little bit.

Q. Since you like to talk about clothes, what do you think about Taylor Fritz and Novak Djokovic, for example?

NAOMI OSAKA: I saw Frances had some tear-away pants, too.

I think it's really fun just to keep, to have a little bit of suspense. I don't know how adventurous guys can be with their clothes. I thought it was really fun. I thought it was cool.

I think on Djokovic's end, he always has some sort of like cool, unique jacket going on. I think in Australia he had different surfaces maybe or something like that? I don't know. Don't hold me accountable on that. I think Djokovic has always some sort of unique jacket.

Q. At the risk of transitioning back to tennis, in the instance that you will play Sabalenka, you've played several times this year but not on grass. How does that matchup change on grass?

NAOMI OSAKA: I mean, I'm not sure. Like, obviously I've been doing really well on grass this year. My confidence is pretty high. For me, I know what my grass court tennis looks like. It gives me a pretty stable mindset going into the match no matter who I play.

I also don't really have as many doubts as I did on clay court. Maybe it would be a little bit better for me on grass. But I'm not so sure.

Q. So far you played round one on Court 3, round two on Court 2. Round three you've been on Court 1. How different do those courts feel? Is adjusting to a new court each round something you have to think about? Would you like to be on Centre Court to complete the show-court set?

NAOMI OSAKA: I don't mind Court 1. Me and Court 1 finally have a good relationship, so... I don't mind going on Court 1 again.

I think the Centre Court here for some reason might be the scariest Centre Court to me. I don't know why. Going down those stairs... Granted, I haven't played on the Centre Court frequently. Going down those stairs, it's the opening, like this huge dome. I feel more aware of it than any other Centre Court that I've ever played on.

So yeah, me and Court 1, we can just keep going (smiling).

Q. It's funny, having not played Aryna for so long, you've obviously played a lot already this year. You could potentially play again. Does it help when you've played somebody quite a lot recently, or would you rather not to have done that if the results haven't gone your way?

NAOMI OSAKA: I think from my end, I don't mind playing someone recently. Even if I look at my results, I have only lost to like her and Iga for the past couple months. Hey, a win is a win. I'll take that.

Also, she's the No. 1 player in the world. If there is someone I had to lose to, I would pick that ranking position.

If anything, I would say I learned from all of those matches, so hopefully I can apply, if I do play her.

Again, Ostapenko is a really tough opponent, too, so we have to kind of just see what happens.

Q. You've been moving really well all year. I just remember in years past when you came back after having Shai, you talked a lot about not feeling totally comfortable in your body. Are those two things connected, if that's kind of what you were talking about, that specific movement? If so, when that kind of switched for you?

NAOMI OSAKA: Well, the exact moment was when I lost in DC last year. I remember thinking I lost this match, but I feel like I could move again. Then obviously after that I did pretty well in Montreal and the US Open.

I felt like a significant click. It took way longer than I thought it was going to take. Yeah, ever since then, I've felt like I've been moving okay. I got injured at the start of the year.

But the clay season, the movement has been pretty good. I think I'm doing okay or decent on the surface, too.

Q. How did training on a hard court make you feel like you figured out grass?

NAOMI OSAKA: You know, Tomasz is doing a lot of really weird, like, drills that I have to come forward. I was never one that was too comfortable coming forward. It forced me to see the ball or see the speed of the ball. It's just a bunch of different training drills that made my mind more aware on the depth of the ball and things like that.

Q. Right back to fashion. You've had these big entrance moments at the slams. Are you planning on scaling that at any point outside of the slams? Does Cincinnati need to watch out?

NAOMI OSAKA: Hmmm... I mean, I feel like I do little moments, cute little detail-oriented moments in the other tournaments. I mean, you guys want me to pull up to Cincinnati in a ball gown (smiling).

No, I mean, but also I want to pay respect to Nike, too. They're obviously doing such an amazing job with me, kind of tolerating me and my fashion story. In that way, obviously the Grand Slams are the big moments.

I feel like there are so many different color ways and patterns that we're able to incorporate on the -- I don't want to call them smaller tournaments -- but like the 1000s and the 500s.

Q. You talked in the past about how when you were younger you were maybe a bit of a scrapper, a bit defensive. At what point in your development did you recognize yourself as a great server? When did that become your big weapon?

NAOMI OSAKA: Sometime when I was, like, 15. I don't know why. Like, I tell people this, I played with my sister a lot. I remember my knees always used to hurt because I kept growing.

Then one day I decided to hit my serve as hard as I could. It went in. It was an ace. I thought in my brain if I can just keep doing to this, keep going for it, it would be a really solid addition to my game.

So yeah, that's kind of how that went. But I specifically remember being around 15. After that, I played that Stanford tournament, so...

Q. Since you've been on the tour, how much has that shot changed?

NAOMI OSAKA: Technically I've actually been trying to change it a little bit on and off. With Tomasz, we're trying to make it a little bit more consistent with my toss because I feel like in the past I tossed it a little further back. Maybe that kind of contributed to, like, my ab strains.

Yeah, we do try to tweak it. I don't think any player's content being where they are.

Q. Interested in the dichotomy between you being an introverted person and these headline-grabbing outfits. Do you think fashion and tennis is important for you to express yourself?

NAOMI OSAKA: Yeah, I mean, from my end, it definitely is. I feel like I've been able to tell stories. Even from like the bow dress that I did with Yoon two US Opens ago.

But yeah, just being able to communicate my style, being able to communicate my brand of tennis as well, because I feel like for me, my tennis is a little bit louder than I am also.

But yeah, I just always have loved stories since I was little, movies, books. Being able to tell that in my own way has been a challenge, but it's been really fun figuring that out.

(Naomi's answers to questions in Japanese.)

NAOMI OSAKA: So my friendship with him began in the United Cup. He was so funny. He'd be the only person that would talk to me. I think maybe I was scary to everyone else. But no disrespect to him at all, but he was like this little kid that would come up and keep talking to me. I thought it was so cute.

We've kind of kept having, like, this ongoing little brother-older sister friendship for a while. He was injured for a little bit and he came back. Obviously he's playing really good on grass in Wimbledon so far.

Actually, we've been trading onigiris. His mom, I asked him to ask his mom make me an onigiri so I could try it. I've been winning, so obviously she has to keep making me some more.

It's really cool to have another Japanese player kind of like encourage us and motivate me to keep going.

I think on grass Tomasz doesn't actually talk to me as much as he does on clay. He kind of just tells me to trust my instincts and trust myself going forward. If anything, he tells me to keep up the speed of my ball. So that's kind of the plan that we've been having.

Obviously there's little things here and there depending on the opponents that I play. But it feels more, like, internal from my end.

Yeah, I mean, obviously for me, my big sister is my biggest role model. And my mom, too. Having her around and constantly beating me on the tennis court was something that, I think, ingrained a lot of competitiveness in me.

I've also had a really huge younger sister syndrome where every time I went around with her, everybody would call me Mari's sister. I always wanted to prove myself.

Eventually I feel like we kind of developed in our own ways. I try to do a lot of artsy projects because she's really an amazing artist.

I would say she's definitely, whether she knows it or not, led me really far down this path.