Quotes About Tennis

I don't know how you can go through a four-hour match with Rafa and he never gets a time violation.

Sports have always been a really important part of how I energize myself, as well as how I relax. I spend a lot of my spare time with my family playing tennis, biking and rollerblading.

Tennis is my life, obviously; I need to focus, I need to win. But it's not the only thing. I'm not going to play forever.

I'm trying to enjoy my lie as much as I can and I know that tennis hopefully is going to be my life the next 10, 15 years.

Obsession is a negative word, I do not think that obsession can bring positive things. Not only in tennis but, I mean in any situation of life.

I have always valued the care for my body, and my mind and had holistic approach to life. I always thought this is utmost importance for my tennis.

I've always led a pretty simple life, with few extravagances. The money in tennis never drove me.

Is only a tennis match. At the end, that's life. There is much more important things.

Tennis is a huge part of my life, but I don't base my self-value or my self-worth or the quality of my life on my results on the court.

To be honest, everything in my life outside of tennis is great. I'm doing amazing projects that, if I didn't have time off, I wouldn't be able to focus on.

Tennis has given me this wonderful life and I'm very grateful for it.

I'm 17 years old and there are many great things ahead. If I don't win the U.S. Open this year, it's not going to be a disaster in my life.

I'll let the racket do the talking.

People tend to forget the genuinely lousy level of officiating that was prevalent in professional tennis when I came along. That's why, with my parents' words echoing in my ears—tell the truth; be honest at any cost—I felt I was (don't laugh) on a kind of quest to get things to improve.

Connors always had the ability to turn his anger on and off, which amazed me. I was a one-way street—mad, madder, and maddest. There must have been thousands of times, in tense situations, when a joke was on the tip of my tongue, and instead of saying something funny, I'd just let loose.

The final score was 6–4, 6–2, 6–3. I gave young Andre a hug at the net, and said, "Why did you listen so well?

It was the end of my marriage and the end of my tennis career, both at the same time, and almost nobody knew about it except Tatum and me. I felt as though the bottom had dropped out of the world. I couldn't go on, but I had to go on. In Paris, I was literally crying on the changeovers. I would put my head in a towel and fake being angry.

Arthur and I had had our differences, even our clashes, but I'd had a huge amount of respect for him as a man, a black man, and a positive force for world tennis. I realized too late that he was the greatest ambassador our sport had ever had, and I was determined to try to do better myself.

I had once told myself that after my playing career was over, the two things I would never do were commentary and Seniors tennis. Never say never.

And I want you to understand: I felt terrible. I've felt awful virtually every time I've had one of my on-court meltdowns, with the exception of a few occasions when I really believed I needed to let someone have it. But those really are the exceptions. I've apologized a number of times afterward to umpires and players. And to anyone out there who felt they deserved an apology but didn't get one: I apologize now.

Where money and publicity meet, there's always excitement, but good behavior is rarely a part of the mix. Manners are the operating rules of more stable systems. I got caught up in the rising excitement of pro tennis—in some ways, I was the personification of that excitement—and yes, my behavior got away from me. That's a big subject.

To me, "manners" meant sleeping linesmen at Wimbledon, and bowing and curtsying to rich people with hereditary titles who didn't pay any taxes. Manners meant tennis clubs that demanded you wear white clothes, and cost too much money to join, and excluded blacks and Jews and God knows who else. Manners meant the hush-hush atmosphere at tennis matches, where excitement of any kind was frowned upon.

Why couldn't the game be more accessible to the average person? Why shouldn't tennis get the same kind of treatment—and interest—as baseball, basketball, or football?

I always had to fight to find my best self, to be aware of other people's feelings—and the devil's bargain of it is, the players who are more aware of others struggle more. Boris Becker was like that, too. We would have brilliant moments on the court, and total meltdowns. There was just too much going on inside.