THE CHAMPIONSHIPS

June 30, 2026

Alexander Zverev

Press Conference

A. ZVEREV/A. Blockx

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

THE MODERATOR: Sascha, quite a battle out there today, but you came through. You must be pretty happy.

ALEXANDER ZVEREV: Yeah, happy about it. It was actually quite a similar match to last year, but for me with a better outcome. And of course I'm happy to be through to the second round and still be in the championship.

THE MODERATOR: Questions.

Q. If you have to play the match of your life, the most important match of your life, would you pick clay as a surface or hard court as a surface?

ALEXANDER ZVEREV: Who am I playing?

Q. We don't know. But from the match, depends your own life. You don't know the opponent. The strongest one, but you can pick up the surface, what would you choose?

ALEXANDER ZVEREV: Who's the opponent? Depends. You tell me.

Q. I don't know. It's hypothetical. It's a game, of course.

ALEXANDER ZVEREV: I would choose a fast hard court.

Q. Fast hard court. Thank you very much.

ALEXANDER ZVEREV: I think against the best, best, best, which includes Carlos, which includes Jannik, Jannik is going to be difficult on a fast hard court. Actually, I don't know now, now that I think about it.

Q. That's why we were 50/50.

ALEXANDER ZVEREV: Yeah, I don't know. I don't know. Depends who I play, really. If it's Carlos, definitely fast hard court. If it's Jannik, maybe, maybe clay court, even though he beat me two times this year. Yeah.

Q. You said afterwards on court that you were hoping for your best result here at Wimbledon. Interested to get your take on your side of the draw. Obviously things have opened up with Ben Shelton going out, Jack Draper pulling out. Obviously you still have strong matchups coming hopefully later on down the line, with Djokovic and Sinner on the other side.

ALEXANDER ZVEREV: Honestly, for me, it's very different than a French Open. For me, the draw doesn't really matter, because I have played a top-10 opponent one time in my career here, which was Milos Raonic, in 2017. And all the other years, I have lost to players outside of top 10.

So it's really about me. It's really about me getting through my matches and playing my matches, because yes, maybe, like, the names of Jannik and Novak and all those guys, they're in the other side of the draw, but for me, that doesn't really matter, because historically I have not gotten to them.

So for me, it's about focusing on the matches that are ahead of me to get to those names. I think that's the most important thing.