Aus Open Day 7 - Are Sinner and Djokovic lucky to still be in the tournament?

0:10Jannik Sinner:Hello and welcome to the tennis podcast on what has been a pretty overwhelming day at the Australian Open. The heat has been frankly intolerable. Temperatures have hit 40 degrees Celsius and in fact are still hovering in the low 30s at midnight as we come to you from the air conditioning. Create a Lounge at Melbourne Park. And honestly, the heat has created a cauldron of drama here over the last 12 hours or so. We don't tend to do themes for our shows, but if we did, then today's would be luck. Good luck, bad luck, earned luck and totally random luck. So how did today go down? Well, play started half an hour early at 10.30am in anticipation of the forecast temperatures.

1:02Conditions were hot, but very much bearable for the first couple of hours.

1:07Jannik Sinner:Matt even managed to make an intrepid journey to the John Kane Arena. Give that man a medal. God, that feels like a long time ago that I spent four hours on the John Kane Arena in the company of Lorenzo Mazzetti, Thomas Mahatch, and Greg Allensworth, especially for the occasion. Just to make your trip worthwhile. Exactly. They put Greg on that match for you. I do stand by my takes. I do not like the John Kane Arena. Why? It's so ugly inside and so clearly not a tennis stadium. There's so much of the inside of that arena that is not seating. I just don't like it. everyone's far away from the court.

1:51It can actually have a pretty good atmosphere and it did have a good atmosphere later in the day for Stan Mavrinka and Taylor Fritz. So it is probably a me problem, but...

2:02Jannik Sinner:Do you know what tournament you wouldn't like? Miami. Yeah, speaking of not a tennis stadium. So obviously not a tennis stadium. It matters to me. Yeah, no, I'm with you. I did not go and sit on the John Cane Arena for four hours today. But it was bearable for the first few hours. This was a day where temperatures rose very, very steeply over about a two-hour period. And by early afternoon, things were getting very serious. And then at 2.35pm, the heat stress scale that we've heard a lot about today, the HSS, if you will, hit the magic number of 5.0. And that meant the play was suspended on all the outside courts and the roofs, or roofs, depending on your flavour, were brought across the three show courts.

3:01Jannik Sinner:And that, David, was the day's pivot point. yes because Yannick Sinner at that point was embroiled in a third set against Elliot Spaziri of the United States not a name I imagine many people have heard an awful lot about frankly before this tournament neither had I he's uh he's one of twins um his twin brother plays squash at a very high level he's come through the college system and he's made a real splash at this tournament he's he's beaten Joao Fonseca he's won a five-set match in the last round and here he was against Yannick Sinner really holding his own anyway I mean he won the first set he went a break up at the start of the second set and to be honest all the way through to that point Sinner didn't look quite right to me I mean he looked unstable he he was moving okay but he wasn't it wasn't the same authority behind his shots.

4:00And I mean, the heat we've seen in the past has caused him problems. We saw him cramp and have to leave the courts and retire in, was it Shanghai earlier this year? Early or late last year? A year ago, admittedly, he had a bit of a bug, I think, when he played Holger Runa. But on the very hottest day, his legs were deserting him. He had to take a timeout, which really rescued him on that occasion. Well, this time he'd settled the ship a little. He'd leveled at one set all. But then midway through that third set, cramp set in. And boy, did it set in. I mean, it was dramatic what happened to his body.

4:41He started to feel it in his calf. He sat down and had a little bit of a manipulation when he was sitting down. Then, as Catherine and I were watching on TV, we saw him go to the baseline and just start manipulating his own hand, his own palm, shaking out the fingers in his palm and it was clear the the cramp was starting to spread throughout his body um at at this point the heat index is hitting or nearing five which is the point at which matches on other courts would be suspended that don't have a roof and those that do would eventually be covered and the conditions be made more temperate but at this stage it's blazing hot and Yannick Sinner is in massive trouble because he's playing rallies he almost looks like a newborn foal whose legs are just not quite developed yet the coordination isn't right he he starts to arm serves over that are going probably about 60 or 70 miles an hour and he goes a break of serve down 3-1 and he's in massive trouble he goes over to his support team where Darren Cahill is and Simone Vignotti and with Cahill he he just says just just try to get to the end of the set because at the end of this set you'll get a break you'll get a heat break and you can have a 10 minute rest well frankly he got saved before then because at the odd number of the even number of games 3-1 the the indicator went into the the five region which says that it's it's time to invoke the heat rule and that meant closing the roof the players got to leave he told us that he was sent into a little room just off the court um where he was able to lie down um for eight minutes in cooler temperatures um and when he came back out i mean he was still a little unsteady i thought but basically his recovery had begun and he was able to turn that match around but he was incredibly lucky that he managed to stay in touch enough and I guess the temperature going into the the red zone if you like rather than staying just below it because he was already in big trouble and and unless they had that heat rule which um which was brought in I can't exactly remember how long ago but I remember what caused it 40 degree temperatures for five days in a row in 2014, unless they'd had that heat roll, he would not be in this tournament right now.

7:24Do you feel the same, Matt? I do, yeah. I think in that moment, he was unable to play, really. I mean, he could barely grip the racket, as Dave has described. His movement was incredibly compromised. And there was still such a long way to go in the match in such brutal conditions, it felt to me like he was probably going to end up retiring if the roof hadn't come over in that moment, let alone be able to actually play well enough to finish the match. Because, you know, the contrast with his opponent, Spazieri, down the other end of the court, was stark. You know, he was...

8:08Jannik Sinner:Quote, I felt fresh. He looked really. Yeah, that's what he said to me in the press conference afterwards. And he wasn't bragging. He was unbelievably magnanimous with Basiri. Like he totally accepted what the rules were, that they were correctly applied. He was very accepting of the fact that that took away the advantage that he was experiencing in that moment. That's obviously gutting for him, but he accepts it. But it did take away a significant advantage. He said, you know, I pride myself on that physical advantage. You know, he said, I think I played an ITF match in China once where the registered on court temperature was 127 degrees Fahrenheit.

8:52Jannik Sinner:He was like, I'm not trying to brag here. Or he was he wasn't suggesting lack of fitness on Yannick Sinner's part. He said, like, I know some of this can be can be genetic. But he was like, just from my personal perspective, like I this wasn't a big deal to me. Like I was fine. I felt fresh. I could have gone for several more hours. Whereas Yannick Sinner, I don't think he'd have gone for several more minutes. I mean, we have the example of Shanghai, right? He was physically helped off the court and that was a best of three set match that he couldn't even find a way to hang in and get through.

9:35Jannik Sinner:And look, he knows it. He said it, Yannick Sinner. I was lucky. He said it at Wimbledon. I was lucky against Grigor, but I took it as a sign. Grigor, obviously, having to retire, two sets of love up against Yannick Sinner. He said it last year when he got that huge slice of luck against Tolga Runa in the fourth round. There was the net broke. It did. For quite a long time. For quite a long time. He got 20 minutes off court for a broken net at the point when he was tail spinning physically. And he, Yannick Sinner at the time, said, I had big luck today. Like, he totally owns all this and nobody is going to not accept the luck that comes their way.

10:22Jannik Sinner:But it does feel like he's riding it a bit. You know, Charlie Echolscher asked him flat out impressed today. Do you worry that your luck will run out at some point? And the pricey of his answer was, like, I don't worry about it, but I assume it will. Like, because that's how that's how luck works. He said, I'm doing everything that feels like it's within my power to try and mitigate this vulnerability that I have. But he knows it is a vulnerability, whether it's genetic or something he's yet to uncover in his training. You asked him, David, in the press conference, like, what are you doing at the moment?

11:03Jannik Sinner:What have you done to try and counteract this? And he said, I go to Dubai in the offseason. I, you know, I try and do specific hot weather training in the offseason. He said it wasn't quite as hot this time they went as it was last year. But, you know, he doesn't seem to have made massive strides with this issue that, OK, might only be exposed a couple of times a year. but it's most likely to be exposed at grand slams in five-set matches in the most extreme conditions. And it's a fascinating wrinkle in the Yannick Sinner tale, isn't it? It is. He is a little fortunate that he's playing in an era where there is a heat roll.

11:48I was reminded, looking back over the history of my tennis fandom and watching Jim Currier against Stefan Edberg in the final here in 1993, when the temperatures, I mean, some people were saying in the sun, on the direct sun on the court, were 150 degrees Fahrenheit. And even Jim Currier was saying it was pretty hot out there. And I've never seen anybody able to withstand heat like he could. And there was no break. there was no rest there was nothing I mean personally I think about time that that it was I don't want to see I don't want to see people cramping frankly and yet at the same time I feel this kind of discord because I also feel like Spaziri has had an advantage taken away from him that he has a physical advantage over this opponent today and he wasn't able to make it tell and I don't know where the line is, where the balance should be between safeguarding the health of people that are out there.

12:56Jannik Sinner:And not just the players. Not just the players. The fans, the ball kids. And also Andy Murray said several years ago, you don't want people collapsing in the stands and ball kids collapsing. It's a terrible look for the sport. And I agree with him and I agree that Sinner kind of got lucky and Spazieri got unlucky and I don't quite know where I stand about where the right line is. It's probably about here. But after they came back, you started to see the difference in class because Spazieri didn't go away. He didn't become terrible at all. He was still playing nice tennis. And Sinner equally wasn't suddenly fine.

13:40Jannik Sinner:But he worked his way back in. I don't think I'm just another point. I've never seen a player able to overcome cramp once it comes on the way Sinner is. He said in the press conference that I've, I've learned about my body and that I, if I do certain things, I can kind of make it go away. He chugged so much pickle juice. Yeah. Great advert for pickle juice. Very interesting. Buy shares in pickle juice folks. Very interesting that he said to me, I didn't sleep well last night. and he wonders whether that was something to do with it. Well, the question I wanted to ask him but didn't get a chance because there were a lot of questions for him in press today is like how much is anticipation of and anxiety about this issue that he's obviously very conscious of playing into it because stress is a big factor in cramp.

14:34Jannik Sinner:Just look at the scenarios in which Carlos Alcaraz is cramped and the most famous one against Novak Djokovic at the French Open, which weren't in extreme conditions and was almost entirely down to stress. And I do just wonder, you know, it's been the talk of the town for the past few days. This upcoming weather forecast is going to be again because the forecast somehow is even worse for Tuesday. And, you know, everybody knew, we talked about it days ago, that Djokovic was probably kind of manoeuvring his schedule to make sure that he could ask for night session tonight. He's a 10-time champion here.

15:12Jannik Sinner:What he wants is they're going to have deference to that. It all would have been building up to today. And I know he's a cool customer, Yannick Sinner, but I can't imagine he wasn't concerned about it at all. And I did just think the line about the sleep might have been a bit of an insight to that and it's one of those where that fear that anticipation is probably going to build every time it happens it's like an allergic reaction you know it'll get get a bit worse the next time yeah and it is i think gonna be a very difficult thing for him to solve in his career like i don't think just doing your three or four week off season in dubai at a time of year when it's not that punishingly hot there typically is going to make all the difference to me it would it would probably involve overhauling your entire training program and taking yourself to become someone who trains in florida rather than someone who trains in europe and i i'm not sure that he's well i don't think he's going to do that i'm not sure it necessarily would be worth doing that you might lose something else that you know he's got this incredible stability and so far as we're talking about whenever he's had these bits of luck okay he's needed them but they haven't gone on to like derail this whole tournament they have been one-off matches and then he's gone on to win the titles you know here last year being the sort of prime example um and he may well do that this year as well and yeah i think it is a difficult thing for him to really, really improve.

16:56And I think Spitzeri put it well in terms of how much of it is kind of genetic. And I have absolutely no doubt in my mind that Yannick Sinner is within the realms of his current setup, leaving no stone unturned in terms of trying to be in the best possible physical condition. It's just these sorts of temperatures and heats affect him differently to other players and that's that's just kind of the fact of it um but and and personally i agree with david like i'm i'm super glad we have this heat rule like i i had a lot of commentary today that i thought thought was really troubling you know stuff like no one's died on a tennis court due to heat um and oh let's should we wait till they do until we do something right like exactly and also like plenty of people have died from heat not on a tennis court like heat is a very serious very serious thing um and it should be taken seriously and any very macho kind of extremely and look and it it was lucky for sinner that it ticked over at right that point but also like you know there could be an argument that he could have got the night session today and he wasn't lucky in that sense and you know he was a bit unlucky that his side of the draw fell on this day that kind of goes both ways as well and I thought the whole day was I thought handled quite well by the tournament actually I I think you could, again, there'll be some people arguing why were the matches this evening on the show courts played under the roof when play resumed on the outside courts and that heat index did drop below five.

18:57But as much as I have an open-the-roofs policy, I do feel a bit differently about that when it comes to heat and I would always err on the side of caution. And look, I do absolutely agree with you, Matt, that our roofs agenda that we're very happy to push, like that's a different thing where heat is concerned, which is a matter of health and safety as opposed to, you know, weather and preventative anticipation of inclement rain or whatever. I guess just the fact that they left the roofs on the show courts this evening once play had resumed on the outside courts, It just, for me, a little bit muddied the very neat clarity of the heat rule, which is we activate it when it reaches 5.0.

19:50And this is what happens when we reach 5.0. And that's exactly what happened at 2.35. And once it dips below 5.0, the rule is disactivated. I guess it just sort of slightly muddies that for me. and it makes me think, oh, OK, well, if we don't, if there's some leeway there, then kind of why didn't we start the day with the roof closed? Why did we have to see ball kids running around when the heat index was 4.8 and 4.9? I guess that's kind of where it comes down. Yeah, sure. I can get on board with that as well. I like clarity. Just on Sinner, there will inevitably be people who think it's very convenient that it happened to just be the exact moment to close the roof when the guy could barely walk.

20:44Well, look, he thinks that too. He knows he got lucky. And it wasn't only his court that stopped. You know, they applied this rule consistently across the grounds, you know, at that moment. It wasn't done for Yannick Sinner. It was done because the heat index hit five. And it was circumstantially extremely fortunate, but that's the way it goes. And that is the key to it, isn't it? That it is scientifically done and it's on a dial and the dial says, and right now we do. Yeah, absolutely. And yeah, and as I said, if you have any sort of feeling that the tournament was really favouring Yannick Sinner today, well...

21:29He was in the day session. He was in the day session. I'm sure he'd have loved to have played Djokovic's slot tonight. Right. Right. And then on the other hand, you have, well, at least he was on a show court, which did have a roof and was able to resume. And, like, obviously tennis is a sport that is very heavily weighted in favour of top players. You know, they're always more likely to be on the receiving end of good luck if there is some good luck to go around. It's like celebrities receiving free stuff, isn't it? Like, they're the ones that least need it. but they're the ones getting the goodie bags.

22:05Okay, so that's Sina through to the next round to face Luciano Darderi. Darderi taking out Karen Hashanov today in four sets. So that's massive chunk of luck number one dealt with. We move on to massive chunk of luck number two of the day. A very different type of luck, a very different incident. It came in Novak Djokovic's three-set victory over Burtick van der Zanschelp. 6-3, 6-4, 7-6. Sounds pretty straightforward, doesn't it? But this was a dark and stormy Novak Djokovic this evening, David. And there was a big incident in the second set. Yeah, he was cruising early on. He was set up. He was breaks up in the second set.

22:59and frankly Botic Van der Zanschel didn't have a good day. He was not playing particularly well. He started to have a problem with his arm as well, lost some power and had some treatment and then came back out after that and suddenly seemed to regain his power and the shackles came off and he became quite dangerous. But in the midst of all this, Novak Djokovic's mood was darkening. He was getting, I think, a bit irritated at some of the crowd members who were cheering on the underdog and obviously van Zanschel as a Dutch player has a lot of support with him and they were making themselves heard and you know we've seen this before Djokovic against the crowd and listen he'd got a huge amount of his own support as well Serbian flags flying everywhere but it was quite confrontational in that way and you could see him getting more irritated as it was going along so it's late in the second set and a serve comes down towards Djokovic and it's called out and Djokovic just slashes it cross-court away with the forehand in the direction of the net post where a ball kid is kneeling next to it and this ball was hit really really hard I mean it was just pinged perfectly clean connection by Djokovic like a whipped forehand pass and it missed the ball kid I mean I spoke to the commentator afterwards who's who showed me with his hands apart and it it was backed up by the video evidence from that angle as well it missed by I don't know a foot if that very very close to hitting that ball kid maybe in the face difficult to tell exactly the height but that's more or less what I was looking at and I mean first and foremost that is really really dangerous you know that kid is just kneeling side on to Djokovic if that ball hits them in the face and that is a distinct possibility that could have happened thankfully it didn't that could cause serious injury or serious damage I mean this was hit way harder than the ball that Djokovic hit in the US Open in 2020 that hit a line judge in the neck and caused him to be defaulted had that ball hit the ball kid I don't think there's any conversation to be had he would have been defaulted again today and that's what commentators Colin Fleming and Mark Petchy were saying immediately he was very nearly in a default situation here John Blom was in the umpire was the umpire in the chair at the time I think he was considering giving him a code violation for what he did even though he didn't hit the the ball kid opted not to certainly one wasn't given but that was a pretty shocking moment and one that has kept Novak Djokovic in this tournament I think the fact that he got away with that he got lucky I asked him about it in the press comments I put it to him that this had happened and asked if he felt a little fortunate he interrupted the question to say yes I I I I apologise for doing that, for any distress I caused the bald kid, and I did get lucky.

26:22And the fact of the situation you described with John Blom, the umpire, and sort of his hesitation about whether to give a warning, even though there was no nefarious outcome, like that exposes, not that it needs exposing, it's been exposed so many times, but it exposes how insufficient the rule is on these sorts of incidents, I think. Like, should it be an outcome-based rule? Like, why is there nothing concrete in the rules about punishment for hitting a ball carelessly or recklessly or in a way that is out of control? I think we have the technology now with replays and everything to entrust umpires to make judgment calls about when a ball is, when the player is in control of a ball.

27:20And truthfully, I think if you had some strict rules, strict clear rules with severe punishments, regardless of the outcome, I think there would be vanishingly few incidents. It would just stop happening. Nobody would be doing it casually in the way that Novak Djokovic did tonight. in the way that it was Alex Mickelson, wasn't it, in Winston-Salem last year. Look, there are tons of examples, but this was quite a bad one tonight, I think. Yeah, it was. And we do see it still. People, yeah, quite recklessly hitting balls towards the crowd, towards officials, towards ball kids. It happens, and it never feels quite right that they're just allowed to move on simply because they've not ended up hitting someone.

28:23Personally, I think it might also feel a bit wrong if it resulted in a default, if you lost someone from a tournament for something like that, that might just be a sort of heat of the moment thing that didn't end up hurting anyone. I'm not sure that's entirely satisfactory either but I would certainly be in favour of some sort of scale of punishment and if you do something like Djokovic did today it doesn't really feel right that you can just totally get away with it versus someone who might do something not quite as bad but just end up slightly hitting someone and end up being out of the tournament there seems to be a weird, slightly illogical difference in the level of punishment for what is a very similar act.

29:11It's just the outcome is slightly different. You know, could you lose a set or that sort of thing? It does feel like tennis needs to sort of up its game in terms of trying to stamp some of this out because it just shouldn't be happening. You should just... These kids or officials or people in the stands should not be in danger from something like this, from players. And it was an odd, it was odd the way this match turned, because I thought Djokovic came out in the same way he'd been all tournament, composed, serene, hitting the ball cleanly, looking like he was going to wrap this up quite quickly.

29:53And then he did get irritated, and his mood really soured. He was quite chippy with John Blom at the end of the match, wanting John Blom to be firmer in the way that he was speaking to the crowd and telling them not to make noise. I must say he came up with an absolutely remarkable passage of play to save a set point in that third set and stop it going into a fourth, which could well be something we look back on later in the tournament if he ends up being more of a threat to Sinner and Alcaraz. Because he needs that energy, doesn't he? Because he needs to be getting off the court as quickly as possible in these early rounds.

30:30He's said that. And he came up with a huge forehand to save a set point and then gave the defiant finger, you know, finger to the lips, telling the crowd to shut up. And we got ear cupping at the end of the match. We got the violin celebration, which I know he says is for his daughter, and I'm sure it partly is to his daughter, but I don't think his daughter was there tonight. Well, he also then transitioned into a sort of conducting gesture as if the louder you cheer against me, the more I enjoy it. That's the gist of it. I do, just purely on the tennis situation, and Novak Djokovic is a threat in this tournament, he was very keen to point out tonight that's three matches played, no sets dropped.

31:18There's only one other time that has happened for Novak Djokovic since his last Grand Slam win in New York in 2023, and that was Roland Garros last year, when, OK, look, he ran into Yannick Sinner, and Sinner was far too good and that was the story of last year. Maybe Roland Garros wasn't that different to Wimbledon or to the US Open, but I think it is probably the one that we would single out as... I think it was very different. That's the one where he played really well. He did. He was great in that semi-final. He pushed Sinner big time, even though it was straight sets. They were close. Just putting that out there.

31:57And he definitely thinks it's significant. Exactly. It might not be decisively significant, but it's kind of the only chance he's got, isn't it, to get through these early rounds cleanly. It's Jakob Mensik for him next, who's beaten Ethan Quinn late this evening on the Kia Arena in three sets, but three tight sets. So a rerun of the Miami final from last year for Novak Djokovic and a big breakthrough for Mensik to be in the fourth round here. Matt a little rundown if you will on the five sets of Lorenzo Mazzetti beating Thomas Mahatch in four hours and 27 minutes This was a good match a really good match especially considering the conditions it was played in you know it wasn't the absolute hottest point of the day given the fact that the roof was open for for four sets of it, but it was still extremely warm and challenging conditions, and the roof did close for the fifth set.

33:04Mazzetti came out pretty passive, like he often does, actually, on a hard court. I think it takes him a while to impose his game on this surface, and he was also serving badly in that first set. He sort of threw his mum under the bus in his on-court interview and said that he was serving like his mother in the opening set, which was, I'm not sure entirely necessary, but I think, you know, he was sort of, he said it in a jokey way. But Mahatsch, by contrast, was excellent in the opening set, really aggressive and deservedly won it, I thought. But then Mazzetti sort of got control of it, started serving better.

33:49and honestly I thought he was going to win it in four sets. He was the one really pressing in that fourth set and fair play to Mahatch because we've seen him go away in these sorts of matches and not resist against a good player at a grand slam and he really did. As much as Mazzetti was pushing for the break, Mahatch kept finding big serves on break points, kept finding his best tennis at the big moments and ended up pinching that fourth set, sort of stealing it from Mazzetti who'd kind of been the better player throughout. But then Mazzetti played a brilliant game to start the fifth. A couple of absolutely remarkable backhands down the line in that game to grab the break and ended up winning it in five.

34:33And it's the kind of match that the highlights package will look phenomenal. Like it will look like peak tennis. Like how can you play more aesthetic, stylish tennis than these two? like there was some jaw-dropping rallies there were large periods where it wasn't like that and they were there for all of them right and and and 40 degrees yeah and and the heat was tough and there were some bad misses and some odd decision making i think but like the highs of this were very high and for massetti that's that's the first time into the second week at the australian open So it really, really backs up this progress that he's made on the hard courts.

35:15So, yeah, big for him. He's got Taylor Fritz next, who ended the Australian Open career of Stan Wawrinka. Good match. Like, you know, it was we saw Stan Wawrinka out there. He had his moment a couple of days ago. It was incredibly special. He put on a good show today. He looked like himself. And I think he's happy with with how it all ended. four sets to to taylor fritz he got his craig tiley gift bag and he got some beers yeah he got a couple of beers out to have with craig straight afterwards but i will remember it for a point in the final game actually where stan was trying to break back and and extend this match even further the crowd going wild and i think he deliberately decided to just hit ripped backhands for the duration of a rally regardless of what ended up happening because most of the time over the course of this tournament and sort of 40 year old stan verinka he doesn't do that anymore he chips he guides and occasionally he pulls the trigger but he doesn't just bludgeon the backhand the way he used to well taylor fritz has got a pretty nice backhand and he just decided to go toe to toe with him and and stan i think hit six one-handed topspin backhands in a row five of them to to rally with and they were firmly hit and it was kind of like macho tennis from the two of them right who can hit their backhand harder and suddenly the old 2015 vavrinka came out with the final shot of the rally and he absolutely marmalized this backhand and i just jumped out and my seat laughed.

37:01Oh, it's so funny. That is the last point he will ever win at the Australian Open. He didn't win another point in the match. Fritz closed it out, but it could not have been more fitting and in his image, unloading on the backhand. The shot that he will always be known for. It was a real iconic moment, actually. I loved it. We'll be seeking that out. Ben Shelton has set up a fourth round match with Kasper Rude, who's just beaten Marin Cilic in four sets on the second court. Shelton beat Valentin Vachero 4-4-6. Another straight sets win for him, David. Yeah, I went and asked, because I'm really high on Shelton's form here at the Australian Open, and I went into his press conference.

37:53Having just been in Vachero's, I'd never met Vachero before, but I asked him what did he make of the level of Ben Shelton today because we were talking about Vashro is he actually good is this proof that he's good and and and what can we expect I think he was good I think he played well today and he lost three fairly close sets I said what did you think of Ben Shelton's level he said it was a joke he said his forehand you know people talk about his serve but right now he said i couldn't believe the power of his forehand and he said he said if he serves like that and if he hits his forehand like that and if his backhand is solid he said he's the third guy now i mean you want to big up the guy who's just beaten you but i then i went into shelton's press comments and i said you've had good progress at a number of grand slams now I've reached a couple of semifinals.