Tennis press conferences and interviews used to be a lot more interesting than the current era of monotonous cliches and scripted talk. One player who didn’t hide his feelings and thoughts was Goran Ivanisevic, the 2001 Wimbledon champion who was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 2021…
Here (USA) food is not good. If you eat those Mac Donald cheeseburgers hamburgers you go to the hospital forever. But they got used to here because they eating all their life, these things but they didn’t get used to those, this food, but I am eating okay. I was eating good food. I went to some Italian restaurant, but I don’t know. Probably the air, something is wrong, I don’t know what. I don’t hate — I like America, but I don’t know, last year I didn’t felt like this year. I wasn’t sick, but this year when I came from first day, I was sick, everyday, I had some problems here. I don’t know why.
Q. I just want to ask you about going crazy. How do you know when you start to lose it? You start looking around at the stands?
GORAN IVANISEVIC: Yeah, I start to rush. I walking like crazy man. Just walk. I don’t know where I am going. Like you running against somebody, somebody chasing you and you are running. So that is the problem. Then I can’t start just running, running. But one day I say, “This is enough. You have to stop. You have to try to control this. And now I am good. I am not running anymore.”
Q. Did somebody ever– obviously English is not your first language. So I am interested in your use of the word “Crazy,” because if clearly you are not a crazy man.
GORAN IVANISEVIC: I mean crazy. I don’t mean crazy like crazy. I mean crazy nice way, you know, it is different.
The trouble with me is every match I play against five opponents – umpire, crowd, ball boys, court, myself.
Lately, my mind is like an orchestra. If you don’t have the conductor, you don’t know what to do. One guy is playing jazz, one guy is playing rock and roll, another classical. It’s a big mess.
My fines? I pay more fines than some guys’ career prize money on the tour.
I must be the only player in the world who ever injured himself for a tournament by stepping on a shell on the beach. I don’t know what I’m going to do.
Andre Agassi · ATP · Croatia · Goran Ivanisevic · Head · International Tennis Hall of Fame · Wimbledon
