James Blake
James Blake
James Riley Blakeis an American retired professional tennis player. Blake is known for his speed and powerful, flat forehand. During his career, Blake had amassed 24 singles finals appearances, while his career-high singles ranking was World No. 4. His career highlights included reaching the final of the 2006 Tennis Masters Cup, the semifinals of the Beijing Olympics and the quarterfinals of the Australian Openand US Open, as well as being the former American No. 1. His two titles for the...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionTennis Player
Date of Birth28 December 1979
CountryUnited States of America
Whether I win or lose, it's nice to be able to give it my best.
We know what's at stake. If we don't win this match, we can't win the Davis Cup next year.
To win on Tommy's serve was great. It was welcome. I had no regrets going after his second serve on match point. Six months ago I wouldn't have had the confidence to do it. Early in the year, the break points were the ones I was missing. I need to keep those points going my way.
I'm going to try to play within myself, ... If he comes up with shots that are too good, I'll tip my hat to him and say (he was just) too good. If I do need to adjust, if I'm getting beat, if I'm down a set and a break, he's really beating me that way. I might have to adjust and figure out some other way to play. But I'm not going to go out just trying to blast winners from every corner just because it's Andre Agassi. I'm going to try to play my game.
This couldn't have been better preparation for that match, ... He (Lopez) has one of if not the best lefty serves out there. If he doesn't, Rusedski probably does. I am looking at the two best lefty serves back to back and getting a win against one could correlate to getting a win (against) another.
They're going to have fun whether I win or lose, ... and that takes a lot of pressure off me.
It's not easy to play against him. I'm just happy to get finally get a win against him. He's one of the best players of all-time.
It was definitely unfortunate. He gave it his all. He did everything he could to win that match.
It was very important to me because half the tour is in Europe, ... I'm excited and it gives me confidence to know that I can win here. This is the first time I've had success in the European season. Other times I've kind of made my rankings just on the U.S. season and maybe down in Australia a little bit.
On clay, his serve still isn't a weapon, but he can back it up really well. Here, he wasn't able to do that. I was able to hit a couple of clean winners off of first serves, and that can rattle you early.
To be able to win in front of my friends and family is one of my greatest memories to date. It was a big turning point for me and propelled me to my great finish at the U.S Open and then throughout the rest of 2005.
Tommy just steamrolled me (in 19 minutes) in that first set, ... He returns your serve so well, it seems like you have to win every point three times.
Had a ground-rule double, ... The wind was blowing so hard. I had no chance.
He's a good friend, and those are always interesting matches. We're friends, but tomorrow we're going to want to go out and beat each other's brains in. On the court, we're both professionals and want to win the title.