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U.S. OPEN


August 28, 1995


Boris Becker


NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK

Q. Boris, did you play as well as the score indicates?

BORIS BECKER: I did play very good. He is not a natural hard-court player, but still I was able to put upon him my aggressive game and I didn't make many unforced errors; put the pressure on him all the time. Yeah, I did play good.

Q. How important is it with the heat, the way it is to get on and off in the early rounds?

BORIS BECKER: It is very important; especially when you sense that that match is going to be yours, you know, if you don't make any major mistakes, and after the first two sets, I was trying to get an early break and then sort of cruise to the end. I was able to do that. I didn't really break much of a sweat - played an hour and 20 minutes which is very, very short for best of five hard court match, yeah, I didn't -- wasn't very exhausting.

Q. Boris, at Wimbledon, even though everybody was looking at Andre and Pete, you had a lot of focus on you too because it was Wimbledon. Here at the U.S. Open, most of it again is on Andre and Pete. Is it good that there is less attention given to you; do you like that at this stage?

BORIS BECKER: Basically, it is the whole year, it was either basically Pete or Andre. It was not only Wimbledon or U.S. Open. For myself, I am just very glad to not be in the spotlight all the time. I have been in this game a few years. I have been many years on the very front of the spotlight. I am just happy to, you know, to do what I like very much and, you know, I hope I can speak through my wins and my matches and hopefully by the end of the tournament you will talk about me a little bit more then.

Q. Can you tell us a little bit about the reason for the breakup with Nick at this stage?

BORIS BECKER: Yeah, I don't want to go into that really. We brought out a statement together at the beginning of the week and that is all, at this stage, I want to talk about.

Q. For those who didn't see the statement, can you just describe how the relationship has changed, just the facts of it as opposed to reasoning?

BORIS BECKER: I mean, it is a fact of life that he is not the youngest anymore. We had great two years almost; just he didn't want to travel to every tournament and I personally feel like a coach has to be at all the places because -- especially when you work for Grand Slam Tournament, every week you practice prior to the event or every tournament is important, and he just wanted to concentrate more on his academy, and that is the main reasons why we parted.

Q. Do you credit him with having brought your ranking back up? Would you credit him with some of the success you had over the past two years?

BORIS BECKER: Very much so. When I first contacted him in November of '93 I wasn't playing good tennis anymore and through him and through all the people in his academy and through his coaching, I am back to one of the best players in the world, and it is definitely because of him. But, you know, the N.B.T.A. is not only him. He has many good coaches; many good players in the academy and I was able to practice with them often and obviously, on many occasions, Nick was there; we could talk about many, many things.

Q. Boris, are you surprised that Edberg is still having some problems in terms of his results?

BORIS BECKER: I think I followed him today and he seemed to be playing all right. I don't understand your question.

Q. Just he is struggling this year. Are you surprised by that? Do you think you have an idea why he is struggling?

BORIS BECKER: You know, there is always an half empty cup -- you can see it half empty or half full. Many players wish to have a struggling a year like Stefan has had this year. On the other side, he is one of the great champions of the last year and from his standpoint, he had a tough year, but, you know, many people talk about me two years ago that I was on my way out. It is just a question of weeks now and here I am playing still pretty good. I think it is the same with Stefan. Once you are a champion you cannot lose it overnight. He had some problems with his shoulder, I heard during Wimbledon, during the hard court summer. He was injured a little bit and with the competition, which these days, you have to be on top of your game every tournament if not you are going to go out early. So I personally believe Stefan has many more good tournaments left in him.

Q. Boris, as someone who came up with the tournament juniors with Steffi, have you had an opportunity to talk to her about her situations right now?

BORIS BECKER: No, I haven't.

Q. After what happened last year in the first round, was there any special preparation you took this year to get ready?

BORIS BECKER: Actually I was just hoping to play during the day and I was hoping to play under normal hours. Apart from that, this is probably the toughest Grand Slam of any of them and the weather conditions are always changing here. It can be very, very hot. It can be very windy here. So I was just glad to be playing on Monday; to be playing in the afternoon and, you know, played an hour and 25 minutes pretty solid match and I am 100% better already than last year.

Q. Boris, you mentioned that you have been doing this for ten, eleven years now on Tour?

BORIS BECKER: Actually it is my 11th Open, it is quite a long time.

Q. Stefan has played in 50 straight Grand Slam events without having missed one. When you look at numbers like that and consider that you are probably not far off of that mark, I mean, do you consider the longevity or is that just an absurd number to you?

BORIS BECKER: Actually would have been close, but I missed a couple on the way. I wasn't playing -- I was playing every U.S. Open and every Wimbledon, but I have missed a few French and a few for Melbourne, but I think it is important not only for us, Stefan or myself, but also for the game that successful players stay there a long time because I personally think it is important to the game that you have the young and you have the bit older ones in it, and that is -- that makes it for exciting tennis matches, and hopefully we both can stay around many more years, you know, playing good tennis obviously. That is the key line. You have to be good in order to stay around.

Q. Did it bother you couple years ago when people started to talk about, you know, Becker was on his way out?

BORIS BECKER: Well, I actually took it with a sense of humor. I really couldn't understand it. At 25, they were talking about the "old guy", you know, so I took it with a sense of humor and I just knew that if I am able to hit a couple of months of good practice and good tournaments, you know, and obviously the desire has to be there and the concentration and good people with you, the success will come. Just cannot go away all of a sudden like turning out of the light. I was able to do that. I had good management, good coaches around me and I am back being one of the best players in the world.

Q. Boris, in some other sports like baseball and basketball, football, seems to be peak ages around 25 to 30. For some reason, people think you are old at 25 in tennis. What do you think is the peak age in tennis?

BORIS BECKER: Physically, I think in his prime between 25 and 30. A lot comes -- especially in tennis, a lot comes into play with -- with your mind and you have to be focused all the time and right now the way the system works and the amount of tournaments we have to play to keep up the certain number in the world, it has gotten harder the last couple of years, you know, to stay up because you have to, you know, play your 20 tournaments instead of in the mid '80s, you had to play 12 or even 14 that were sufficient to protect your number in the world, your ranking. And -- but, you know, it is just -- it is a question of which way you want to go. If you want to do it successful, I don't think in tennis there is really an age limit until you are really in you are early '30s, but until then, I don't see no reason why good tennis players shouldn't last long and shouldn't play good tennis also at 30 years old. We had many examples. All right, maybe, for a couple of last couple of years, you don't have the Lendls and the McEnroes and the Connors anymore, but, you know, you have others approaching the 30 and still be able to play good tennis.

Q. Which of the Grand Slams do you think you have the best chance of winning?

BORIS BECKER: French Open, probably. Obviously, Wimbledon, no?

Q. One more thing about Stefan Edberg's 50 Grand Slam tournaments. Can you describe whether that is a special mark considering the injuries that you have had and have not been able to do that, what do you make of him having been able to achieve that?

BORIS BECKER: I think it is an extremely good effort. He is sort of an example for many athletes how you are supposed to live as an athlete and I am personally very friendly with Stefan as you can hear, and I think he -- he has a chance to go for 60.

End of FastScripts...

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