Maria's strengths are her serve and that she is mentally tough. I have nothing to lose but to just go out and play my own game against her. I've wanted to play her since going into retirement. |
Maybe all these three years, I freshened up a little. I'm just really enjoying every second of being around here. |
Maybe I have this little underdog thing now, not being out there for three years and coming back. You've seen that in the past with some other athletes and it's nice to feel the same way. |
Melbourne gave me a lot of confidence. And I think that confidence showed here today. I've been improving every week I play. |
My aim was to get seeded here, and I've reached that. |
My life has been very good the last couple of years. I'm very comfortable, and this is really hard work, |
Now I look at it differently because I'm a little older - I don't take it for granted anymore. When you're 17, 18, you think it's ongoing, but it's not. Now I know it. I try to do everything possible to not get any injuries. Be more disciplined. |
Of course, I would think the same thing if Lindsay was coming back after a three-year break. You just don't know until you have the matches under your belt, and at the moment I have only had two matches so far, so I'm interested to see, too, how I go. We'll wait and see what happens in Sydney [Sydney International] and Melbourne [Australian Open]. |
Once you've been the best ... there are no seconds. But I just want to play, see where I'm at and that's pretty much it. |
One day you can be a kid, but another day you have to be like this is your job, you play tennis. You have to work for that. |
One day you can be a kid, but another day you have to be like this is your job, you play tennis. You have to work for that. |
Playing the top players you have to play them over and over. You have to start believing and step by step I'm getting my confidence back. |
Probably I was a little more determined, even more hungry. |
She can be very dangerous. |
She didn't really give me many chances. I just didn't get many opportunities to really do too much with balls. She doesn't make many errors, which she probably still did in Tokyo. Against her, you don't get away with much. |