Australian Open Day 6: Press Conference Snippets

Day 6 of the 2015 Australian Open will be remembered for the eye-opening results of a pair of American women. Venus Williams overcame a 4-6 2-4 and 0-40 deficit to beat Camila Giorgi and Madison Keys ousted number 4 seed, Petra Kvitova, in straight sets. Should they get through Aga Radwanska and Madison Brengle respectively, they'll meet in the quarterfinals. In her press conference, Venus told us how happy she was to be climbing the rankings, an explicit goal of hers. As of this writing, she's provisionally ranked #12 based on her results in Melbourne and could crack the top-10 with a win in her next match.

Serena pinpointed her loss to Muguruza (her next opponent) at the French Open last year as the turning point for her season. She was also very unhappy that Federer lost to Seppi in the third round, saying she doesn't think Roger played badly but Seppi played "really, really well." Aga Radwanska gave us some insights into what her day-to-day relationship with Martina Navratilova is like, telling us that Martina served to her in practice before the Lepchenko match because of the lefty factor. 

We learned that Djokovic broke the safety rules by making an impromptu stop on his way to the tournament to mingle with fans. His exchange when asked about it was typical tongue-in-cheek Nole. Stan had a similar approach when he could sense the Roger questions coming, and Vika informed us she's an original, leggings wearing, sing when she wants to kinda girl. Oh, seems she's got a bit of a potty mouth too. Lastly, the wins by Brengle and Keys set up a fourth round match between friends who let us in on a little secret that we'll hopefully bear witness to very soon!


Q. How much contact are you having with Martina Navratilova at the Open? She's clearly got other interests as well.

AGNIESZKA RADWANSKA: Yes. But, well, I think we could find and plan that everything is working for us both. Of course she's also commentating, but she's always there when I'm practicing or playing match. I think it's easy to do that. We find a plan every day very good.

Q. Do you occasionally hit against her in practice?

AGNIESZKA RADWANSKA: Yes, actually I was played left-handed opponent today, so yes, she was serving yesterday, yes.

Q. You said out on the court that you want to keep secret the advice she gives you. How generally has she helped you?

AGNIESZKA RADWANSKA: Well, I think it's a lot of things, but of course it's in this kind of -- on this level, I think it's just really small details that are very important. Of course everybody can play great tennis, but if you want to win a match or Grand Slam, you really have to do everything right. That's what we're working on, just to focus on very important things and talking on and off the court, and just to figure out everything just to win those seven matches in a row.



Q. Along the same lines as fourth round not being your goal, but with this run you'll probably move up to 12 in the rankings. That's clearly pretty good. What does that mean to you?

VENUS WILLIAMS: I have to tell you, I've been trying a long time to get my ranking up. That's awesome. It's hard to be ranked lower than what you know you are. So it's definitely exciting to see yourself go up the rankings. At the end of the day, I guess it doesn't matter what you're ranked, you still have to win your match; but if you do win your match you get a higher ranking. They both go hand in hand. Yeah, that's awesome. I'm going to try to go better.


Q. What do you remember most about the match against Muguruza at the French?

SERENA WILLIAMS: Losing. But it was a good loss. As angry as I was, it was the best loss I had the whole year last year. Had a lot of them. But that one in particular made me realize what I needed to work on. It opened my eyes towards a lot of things. I was like, Oh, my gosh, if I don't change, then I'm going to be forever in the same position. It actually ended up helping me a lot.

Q. What were your thoughts about Roger's loss?

SERENA WILLIAMS: Yeah, you know, I wasn't very happy, to be honest. I was rooting for Roger. He's been playing so well, on the other hand Seppi played incredible. He served well, he played well, he moved well. He did everything great. If you want to beat the top players, that's what you're going to have to do. I think he proved he could do that consistently for four sets. I don't think Roger played bad. I think Seppi played really, really well.



Q. Everybody is going to ask you this question, of course.

STAN WAWRINKA: Go for it. Roger?

Q. You can't guess.

STAN WAWRINKA: Roger lost yesterday. Yeah, but there's a lot of question over that. How did he play? How did he feel? If I talk to him today (laughter)? Just tell me what you want to know.

Q. What is your reaction?

STAN WAWRINKA: Well, it was a surprise, for sure. I watch not all the match, but big part of the match. I think Seppi was playing really well, playing really flat like he can play. And Roger was not feeling great on the court. You can see. When Roger make double-fault, that mean he not in a big day. Was a big surprise for everybody.



Q. What have those conversations been like after your matches calling home?

MADISON BRENGLE: My mom is just obsessed with the towels. Did you get another towel? Mom, I won. She's like, But the towels. So, all right, got our priorities straight.

Q. Do you get her a towel from every tournament?

MADISON BRENGLE: I got her one from Brisbane. I didn't get one from Hobart. I just think she really likes the slam towels. I'm trying to get as many towels as I can, so I have to try to keep winning.



Q. You talked about staying true to your originality. How are you an original?

VICTORIA AZARENKA: How am I an original? Well, first of all, look at my leggings. There's not many players who can pull that off (smiling). What do you think about them?

Q. Not bad.

VICTORIA AZARENKA: I don't know how to describe that. I'm just being me. I say what I want to say. I laugh when I want to laugh. I play how I want to play. I grunt when I want to grunt.

Q. You swear how you want to swear?

VICTORIA AZARENKA: I do.



Q. I've heard a few days ago when you were driving out to the courts, you asked the driver to stop and have some selfies with your fans, to sign autographs. It's against the rules, safety rules.

NOVAK DJOKOVIC: It's forbidden?

Q. Yes.

NOVAK DJOKOVIC: Okay. I guess I'm waiting for the ticket then. Australian police, I'm here. You know where to find me. Sorry for doing that. Sorry for disobeying the rule.



Q. Madison mentioned an image that you guys shared with a door. I couldn't quite understand what the relation was with your names.

MADISON KEYS: Maddie and I have this thing where we'll see funny pictures and send them back and forth. I saw one where the caption is, There can only be one. There's one girl under a door and another one is sitting on top of it. She was all excited before the match. She was like, You have to win so we can recreate this picture. That was her biggest goal for me. She was like, You have to win because I want to make sure we can have this photo.

Q. What do you think of getting to play someone you know, another unseeded American in the fourth round? Unique situation.

MADISON KEYS: Yeah, I think it's great. We're obviously representing our name pretty well. I mean, Maddie is a great player. She has been around for a long time. She's always that person that can, you know, squeak out wins. She makes a million balls and she fights. So I think it's exciting. I think it's pretty cool that there's not only two Americans playing each other in the fourth round, but that we have the same name.