May 8, 2002 TENNIS MASTERS SERIES Rome, Italy   

C. MOYA/L. Hewitt 6-3, 6-2

An Interview With: 

LLEYTON HEWITT 

THE MODERATOR:  Questions for Lleyton, please.

 

Q.  Can you give us an idea why you had a point penalty given against you?

LLEYTON HEWITT:  What's that?

 

Q.  Can you give us an idea of why you were given a point penalty against you?

LLEYTON HEWITT:  I'm not really sure.  Yeah, I felt like  -- well, you know, obviously the code came when I went up there and disagreed with his call.

You know, in my opinion, you know, pretty average -- not the actual call, but to play two.  I had a play on the ball.  I'd say 99.9% of the time in that situation you play two.  I argued that and I thought I was within my rights to argue that.

You know, I don't know what everyone thought watching or whatever, how late the call was.  But I had a play on the ball and there was a call that came out.

You know, after that, you know, the point penalty, I won the game.  I hadn't had a go at him after that one.  I won points or lost points after that game. Then I grabbed a ball.    Wouldn't even, you know  - you can hardly say "throw" I think , you know, I don't think it was that hard to him  - to check a ball.  You know, because he didn't want me to  -- yeah, he didn't want  -- I didn't say anything to him before I threw the ball.  That, you know, he took that as  -- in anger against him.

You know, in the past I've, you know, he's done a lot of  -- umpired a lot of my matches and we haven't had a problem.  It's the way, I think, you know, at the heat of the moment, how you sort of see it out there.

You know, in the end, Carlos came out and played three big points anyway.  So I would have lost the game anyway.

 

Q.  So when the supervisor came out, was that at your request?

LLEYTON HEWITT:  Yeah, I just asked if  -- but he couldn't do much about it then.  You know, he was, you know, at the other court out there.  And really, you know, he didn't know what had gone on so...

Yeah.  It was , for me, just if  -- you know, the supervisor or the referee just to be made aware of it basically.  I knew nothing could be done because he hadn't seen it or had really no idea what had happened.  So...

 

Q.  (Inaudible)?  What was his reaction then?

LLEYTON HEWITT:  When I said that?

 

Q.  Yeah.

LLEYTON HEWITT:  He didn't give me a reason, you know, what he thought.  He just  -- you know, I said, you know, like two weeks ago that I was throwing the ball in my match against El Aynaoui three or four times, because we were getting dead balls there.  I was throwing it to the umpire.

Not once did I -- you know, when you throw a ball to the umpire  -- it's not like I, you know, turned around and pitched it at him.  You know, I throw the ball gently to him.  And when that happens, you know, I just assumed in the past that they understand what's going on. 

Carlos didn't even know what was going on.  As you probably saw, he was ready to play on the other side.

So, you know, as I said before, it was, you know, weird.  As I said before as well, it probably made no difference to the outcome of the match anyway.

 

Q.  At Monte-Carlo, now here presumably, Carlos will be one of the people that you'll be happy to avoid in the French Open?

LLEYTON HEWITT:  Yeah, probably.  He's, you know, you got to give him a lot of credit.  He's come back through, playing so well on clay.  Then the last couple years, struggling with injuries and stuff.  The way he's playing this year, he has a chance at the French Open, there's no doubt about it.

To play him first and second round in the two Masters Series, you know, it's, you know, probably not the greatest draws you can get, I'm sure.  But I sort of know where I stand going into the French Open, I suppose.  And there's areas of my game I can work on.  I felt like I, you know  -- this evening wasn't, you know, a great move forward I don't think, you know, for the French Open just yet.

But I don't see why not, you know, I can't go back to the drawing board and, you know, play a lot better next week in Hamburg, then a week off practicing and really being competitive in Paris.

 

Q.  What makes him so difficult to play for you, Carlos?

LLEYTON HEWITT:  I don't know.  He really didn't make too many errors the last couple of times I played him.  Whereas, you know, when I played him on the hardcourts, he's made a lot more errors  - especially off his backhand.  His backhand's been extremely consistent, I think, the last couple of times.  His forehand is no doubt his weapon.  But he's got a lot better serve than people give him credit for as well  - and especially on clay.  He gets a lot of cheap points off his first serve.  Whereas a lot of the typical clay court specialists, they sort of just start the point, where he's sort of got an attacking first serve.  You know, he sort of puts you on the back foot right from the word "go."

 

Q.  You're such a great competitor out there.  You're quite firey.  (Inaudible)?

LLEYTON HEWITT:  It's hard to say.  You have to ask them.  You know, there's no doubt I play with a lot of emotion out there.  That's when I play my best tennis.  You know, I feel like most of the time I get pumped up on the right times.  And whether, you know, people view it in, you know, a different way sometimes, you know, maybe it's not the best thing.  But, you know, I think the majority of times it sort of comes out the right way.

 

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May 6, 2002 TENNIS MASTERS SERIES Rome, Italy
L. HEWITT/J. Bjorkman
6-2, 6-3
An Interview With:
LLEYTON HEWITT

THE MODERATOR: First question for Lleyton, please.

Q. How did you feel about that?

LLEYTON HEWITT: Yeah, not bad. You know, hard to get a straight-sets win when you're playing at nine o'clock at night anyway. Yeah, it's tough coming out there and waiting all day. I felt, you know, like I was ready to go anyway. You know, I had all day to prepare for the match and got off to a good start.

And Jonas is a different kind of player, though, than a lot of the difficult clay court players. And it makes it a little bit tricky because you're playing different kinds of shots on clay that you don't normally get playing against the clay court specialists.


Q. Who is the favorite of the tournament?

LLEYTON HEWITT: Favorite... Ferrero is definitely, you know, up there. He's as good as anyone, I think, in the way that he played, obviously, in Monte-Carlo, the way that he's played the last couple of years on clay. He's definitely up there.

I haven't seen Guga play, but I'd never count him out once he made three finals in a row here. He's going to be extremely tough as well.

My next opponent, Carlos Moya's, up there.

Probably Gaudio. Won two tournaments.

I know I'm forgetting guys. There's Safin, guys like this. There's a lot of young guys, I think, capable of doing well.


Q. You played Moya, obviously, in Monte-Carlo. The history of your game is that you find weaknesses that you had in the past and correct them. Presumably, Moya is just another example of that. Do you take that on?

LLEYTON HEWITT: Carlos is going to be -- we played I think four times now, and we've had tough matches every time. He's a tough player to play. This is his best surface. This is where he feels most at home. And, you know, playing him first up in Monte-Carlo, you know, your first match on clay for, what, ten months or so, was a tough ask. I felt like I played all right. The conditions didn't really suit me. The court didn't suit me there. And I can only get better from there. I think that showed going into Barcelona, and hopefully it's still going to be the case here.

Mind you, Paris is three weeks away as well. So hopefully I'm still not going to peak tomorrow - or Wednesday. I'm going to peak, you know, in three weeks' time.

Q. How well-rounded do you find your game now for each surface?

LLEYTON HEWITT: Yeah, well, I've beaten probably the best players in the world on all kinds of surfaces at different points in my career so far. But I feel like still more at home on hardcourt just because I grew up on that. You know, obviously the US Open and Australian Open are probably to me the two Slams that probably suit me the most at the moment still. I would never say that Roland Garros and Wimbledon are out of the question - the way I played against Guga in Brazil and making semis here and Hamburg and stuff like that. Obviously winning Queen's twice and Rosmalen once, I rate myself a chance at Wimbledon as well.

Q. Is there anything in particular -- like we all said, "Oh, it's going to be difficult for Agassi to win Wimbledon," "It's going to be difficult for someone else to win Wimbledon." People will say the same about you - until you win it presumably - because your game doesn't naturally fit into the stereotype of serve and volley?

LLEYTON HEWITT: Yeah, but I just go and look at a guy like Andre. He's won on all four surfaces. He's the same size as me. Our strengths are both the same. We move extremely well and we counterpunch well.

I don't think, you know -- my results on grass so far have been higher than I could have expected for, you know, four years on the tour or whatever I've been , a lot higher. To have won Queen's, and you just got to look at the field that I beat there last year, you know - Sampras, Henman, Rusedski, beat Goran there the year before. I've beaten a lot of tough players on grass who have been Wimbledon champions already or, you know, semifinalists and finalists there.


Q. You feel comfortable on grass and on clay?

LLEYTON HEWITT: I think I feel, you know, a lot more comfortable than a lot of other guys out there, that's for sure, at the moment. Just because I -- you know, grass, we only play on three weeks a year, four weeks a year. Clay, I only play, you know, a couple months on. The rest is hardcourt. Indoors is pretty similar to hardcourt, with a truer bounce.

For me, obviously growing up not playing on grass or clay, it's a little bit of a disadvantage I think. But the more matches I play and the more years that go past, I'm going to get better and better.

Q. Of the two, would you rate your chances at Wimbledon as big as or better than the French?

LLEYTON HEWITT: I think there's probably more guys capable of winning the French than Wimbledon. Whether that, you know, puts me in with a better chance of Wimbledon, I don't know.


But I think, you know, the French, there's so many, you know, good clay court players around. Whereas the grass court players - "typical" grass court players - are hard to find. There's not too many guys that I think -- some of the clay courters don't really enjoy playing on grass anyway.

So I think Wimbledon probably a little bit more. Can get some draws through, I think.

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