00:30I don't know, maybe the fact that I didn't play this tournament for five years and I just wanted to
00:37enjoy one more match, but obviously when it's so tight it's tough, match points on one side, match points on
00:45the other side, that's just a matter of nerves and sometimes a little bit of luck, I think it's needed.
00:52And I don't know, normally I remember everything and now I'm struggling to remember a little bit what happened and
01:00just remember a few points.
01:01But I'm so glad that I finished the match, I felt good physically, mentally, I fought every single point from
01:09the beginning to the end, so I'm really happy.
01:15Yeah, Matteo, how important is your serve in general, how important was your serve today in this game?
01:24My serve is obviously the base of my game, but at the same time I think we've seen in the
01:35past, even with great servers, and I can talk about myself, that when mentally you're not in the game and
01:43you're not at your 100%, it doesn't matter really which kind of weapons you have,
01:48because they're going to let you down a little bit, you know, in the important moments and I think today
01:54my serve worked well in the important moments and that's the proof of the fact that I was there, I
02:02was there mentally, I was tough, I was resilient and obviously it's one thing, it's having a weapon, one thing
02:09is like knowing how to use it.
02:14Ciao, Matteo, congratulations.
02:16Thank you.
02:16You spoke about the nerves and it being tight, can you express how that manifests in your body, like what
02:24it feels like, the symptoms, not necessarily the effect on your tennis, but the effect on your body?
02:30I mean, in general, I feel the, I've been feeling this since I was, you know, I started playing tennis,
02:39it's just the heartbeat goes up, it's tougher to breathe, you know, like you're just going a little bit like
02:44that,
02:44but it's part of what we do, you know, like we're running and chasing balls for five hours under the
02:52sun, it's normal to feel like that, actually, you know, it's important to try to relax as much as possible
03:00and to breathe a little bit slowly.
03:04It does happen that, you know, sometimes every player gets, when they get tight, you just tend to play with
03:13your strength instead of your whole body, you know, like you just get tight and you try to win the
03:18points with your arm and with your whole body and I think that's so normal.
03:25You know, I missed, I don't remember, I missed the 4-12 ball and I, you know, I wasn't attacking
03:33for him, I was just to build the point up and I just missed it because, you know, you're nervous
03:37and maybe just a centimetre difference can make the difference and I shank it, but it's part of what we
03:43do.
03:45Congratulations, Matteo.
03:46Thank you.
03:46You've obviously been in a lot of late rounds of majors before, even if it's been a while for you.
03:52How much sort of do you feel comfortable in this stage getting into the middle part and hopefully the end
03:57part for yourself of this major?
03:58Because there's a lot of guys in the draw who don't have very much experience like you have and how
04:03much do you think that could help the rest of your way here?
04:07I mean, definitely can help.
04:09I know, you know, what it takes to go deep in a slam, but at the same time, it's also
04:15true that, like you said, I haven't been deep in a slam for a long time.
04:20So I think, like in life, it's important to find the balance.
04:25Of course, I don't have, coming in the tournament, I didn't have the confidence, you know, like that I had
04:32a couple of years ago.
04:33But at the same time, I felt, I feel like I built this confidence up.
04:37So I feel confident and, you know, I'm in the fourth round, second week of Paris.
04:42It means that I can go deep and I'm playing well.
04:45Today it was, I think, a high-level match and my weapons are working physically.
04:50I'm there and, you know, finger crossed.
04:56Congrats, Matteo.
04:57You were very emotional after the match point.
05:00I'm just curious if you want to share what was coming to your mind at this point.
05:04What flashbacks, what was going on?
05:08So many things, but maybe the best one was the fact that I doubt about myself a little bit too
05:19much, I think, in the last months and years.
05:24And probably, even though I had unbelievable support from my family, from my friends, from my team, and everybody kept
05:34telling me that I still had it in me, you know, sometimes I just, I have to confess that, you
05:39know, like I thought that I couldn't come back, I couldn't feel good on court again.
05:44And that's why I basically was emotional, because I proved to myself one more time that, you know, I can
05:51do this, I can do it well, I can fight, I can enjoy my time on court.
05:56And that's why.
05:59Precisely, when did you start to feel again that you could practice like you wanted, compete like you wanted, that
06:06you could become a regular competitor again?
06:10It's like I was saying, if you followed a little bit, like after I came back from last summer, I
06:17would say, I always said that this sport needs some time, it needs some momentum and some confidence that you
06:25build throughout the matches, the practices and everything.
06:28And, you know, I felt so, for so many times that the body was there, but the mind wasn't there
06:33and then the mind was there and then the body wasn't, you know, like, and it's, that's, that's tough.
06:38It takes a lot of things in order to play your best tennis, in order to compete in that way.
06:43And, yeah, so I felt like actually pretty good, you know, like also at the end of last year when
06:50I played the Davis Cup, I was feeling really good physically.
06:52And at the beginning of the year, I did a really great pre-season and that was so unfortunate that
06:57I felt my ab again in Australia.
06:59And then, you know, like you start the season with a little bit of doubts again, like it's going to
07:03hold up.
07:04And I worked really hard in order to get out of that mentality.
07:09I just now trust my body.
07:11And, and I think all these matches that I played this year, challengers or a thousand or whatever, just gave
07:17me and brought me here, gave me the confidence to achieve this result.
07:22Mm-hmm.
07:23Mm-hmm.
07:24Mm-hmm.
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