US OPEN

September 5, 2026

Naomi Osaka

Press Conference

N. OSAKA/E. Mertens

6-3, 3-6, 7-5

THE MODERATOR: Congratulations. Another hard-fought three-set victory. Your thoughts.

NAOMI OSAKA: Yeah, I mean, I think today was a lot more dramatic than my last match, but I'm glad to be able to play another match here.

THE MODERATOR: Questions in English.

Q. You said immediately afterward you couldn't believe you got through this one. At what point did you feel like maybe this match was slipping away? Also, how do you go about, like, kind of fighting that negativity on court just to stay afloat and ultimately find your way through it?

NAOMI OSAKA: I mean, honestly, like, on my end, I think I was so hard on myself because I felt like I wasn't playing well. That's ultimately why I had so many doubts in my head, just because I felt, like, I couldn't feel my forehand, and that's one of my best shots. My serve was okay. I felt like my percentage was pretty low.

I'm the type of player that, like, I keep like a rotation of numbers in my head, and once they get really low, it makes me very down on myself.

In the third set, I was just being really overly critical, and then it, like, got to a point where I was just like, Okay, just fight for everything. See if she is going to close it out on her terms. Like, I started pushing a lot, because I wanted to see if she had the guts to hit winners and go for it.

Thankfully, for me, she made a couple of mistakes.

Q. I haven't heard you describe yourself as a pusher in a long time. Did that feel like a big change?

NAOMI OSAKA: I mean, it's not a big change. I think, like when I was younger, I felt like I was a pusher.

It's not a negative term. You know, to be able to get a lot of balls back and force the opponent to hit one more shot, I think that's a skill and a talent. And especially on a very tight match like this, I think it helped me win a couple of very important points.

Q. I'm working on a story about gaps between players winning Grand Slams. It's been a little more than five-and-a-half years since you won your last one. Does it feel like it's been a very long time with all the stuff that's happened in your life since then, or does it still sort of feel like it was yesterday in some way?

NAOMI OSAKA: I mean, like, maybe it would have felt like short if I didn't have a kid (smiling). But I think I had a lot of really big life changes since then. It does feel like a while ago, but since you said five years, that feels a little short.

I don't really know, you know. I think it's all about perspective, and I feel like I've been close a little bit this year and also last year here. You know, I would love to just see where my game takes me.

Q. You called the trainer at 3-4. Was it a calf, was it an Achilles, and how much was it hurting?

NAOMI OSAKA: Yeah, I mean, it was my Achilles. It's kind of like the same thing I've been dealing with since Bad Homburg, and I'm not really sure, like, it's always this nagging thing, and it's never really gone away.

Honestly, I really hate calling physios during matches, because, like, aside from the obvious, I feel like it just kind of makes the opponent think you're injured, and then, like, it's like this whole psychological thing.

So it was bothering me a lot during this match. But yeah, I mean, she rubbed Tiger Balm on it, and I guess that helped, yeah.

Q. Unrelated to the match, whenever you're deciding on what ball to use when the ball crew gives it to you for first serve, what are you looking for? What's your approach to that?

NAOMI OSAKA: I don't decide. I don't know. Okay. I mean, like, who I ask to throw the ball...

Q. No, so like when someone, a part of the ball crew, gives you a ball, which one do you decide, like, how do you decide which one to use for the serve?

NAOMI OSAKA: Oh, the ball itself?

Q. Yeah. Sorry, I should have specified.

NAOMI OSAKA: You're good.

Well, honestly, which is very unprofessional of me, like I actually never cared before, but then talking to Tomasz, he taught me, like, the newer balls are faster. So when I serve, I try to pick the newest balls. But I don't go out of my way to search through them one by one.

I feel like if your serve is good enough, even if the ball is this fluffy, it should go through the court.

(Naomi's answers to questions in Japanese.)

NAOMI OSAKA: Yeah. So, I mean, I wouldn't say it's, like, a huge injury. I would say it's, like, this ongoing problem that I've had since grass season. I don't know why it hasn't gone away. I feel like I've done a lot of things in order to, I guess, make it better, but maybe, like, the time off wasn't enough. I'm not really sure what the reason is, but, I mean, the medical timeout was to address that. You know, she massaged my leg and stuff, so that seemed to help, and gave me Tylenol.

Yeah, I mean, when I put the towel over my head, I was definitely crying a lot. I think it was just from my end. Like, I have no problem losing a match if I feel like I'm playing good, but I just felt like I was playing terribly, and this is my favorite tournament, and I don't know, just a bunch of negative emotions that I felt like I didn't want to go out that way. It kind of, like, reached a peak at that point. I felt like I had to let all that emotion go in order to, like, continue trying and continue fighting. Once that changeover finished, I was able to, like, move forward with a clear head.

Yeah, I mean, it's strange. Like, I felt pretty good in Toronto. I think coming here, I wanted to feel good also. But, like, starting this match, I mean, I know she's a fighter. I know she's a really good opponent. I just wanted to, I guess, close it out as best as I could. So when the first set was over, I felt like immediately, like, oh, she's going to fight really hard in this second set, just because I know her as a player, and I know there's like some patterns of mine that she would have gotten used to. So it was definitely a thought in my head.

Yeah, I mean, it's real interesting. I feel like there's two approaches you can take on my end. Like, I could have either started swinging a lot, and I tried that a couple of times on the forehand, and it just went all over the place, or I could just start pushing, and I felt like that, for me, was the safer option at times. I think that also threw her off, because she was probably expecting my pace to be a lot higher than it was. So I got away with that a couple of times. But I think in the last game that we played, I tried to commit more on my forehand, and I went down the line a couple of times, and I started to feel it a lot better.

I think I just want to have a fun match, you know. I think this match was a lot emotionally, and I just want to have a fun time. I think when I think about having fun or playing point by point, that's when I play my best. I know she's one of the best players in the world, so I have no choice but to come with a high level. For me, I think that's when the most exciting tennis is. So I'm actually really looking forward to that match, because I've played her once before in Toronto, and that was quite recent. I kind of know a little bit of her game.