Beaten by Iga Swiatek in the US Open final on Saturday after her failure at Wimbledon, Ons Jabeur is confident that she will have other opportunities to win a Grand Slam tournament and has set a clear goal for next year: ” the place of N.1 “worldwide.
The 28-year-old Tunisian will be world No.2 on Monday when the next WTA ranking is published, behind Swiatek.
QUESTION: How do you analyze your match?
ANSWER: “She started really strong and put a lot of pressure on me. I was trying to get into the game. It was very hard. Especially since at times she really did very well. played. In the second set, I had my chances. I came back to the score, I came back… I would have liked, at some point, to be in front and to build. Sometimes, she did not play as well as in the first set and maybe I should have tried my luck more. But to be honest, I have no regrets because I did everything possible. Maybe I would have liked to serve a little better. It would have helped me a lot. We know how Iga plays in the final, she is very difficult to beat. So I will keep the positive and work on what I missed today (Saturday).
Q: You have played two Grand Slam finals in two months. Now, we will have to wait four months to replay the Australian Open: are you impatient, or happy to have more time?
A: “It’s good to have more time to prepare. But I have a big tournament coming up, the Masters (October 31-November 7). It’s important for me, I consider it a mini – the Grand Slam tournament. I’ve always dreamed of playing it. I hope to build up more confidence there to prepare really well for next season because I’m counting a lot on the coming season. From the point of view of points, I I don’t have any to defend in Australia, nor at Roland-Garros, nor at Wimbledon, which is good. So I’m definitely aiming for the N.1 spot.”
Q: Is this loss harder to swallow than Wimbledon?
A: “Wimbledon was hard to swallow. This one is going to be too. We’ll see in a few days if I managed to get some sleep. But that’s tennis. And that’s all me: I took a long time to win my first WTA title, so I think it will take me a while to win a Major as well. The most important thing is to accept it, to learn from the lost finals. But I’m not going to give up I’m sure I’ll play more finals and I know I’ll play my best.”
Statements taken at a press conference