tour

special opponents

Never lost against Max Mirnyi

Like any other tennis player I have my favourite opponents and others I don't really like to play. Here is my list of special opponents. Max Mirnyi for example has never won a single match against me on Tour. My record against him is 6:0. In the finals of the Masters Series Tournament in Stuttgart I won against Mirnyi 6:2, 6:2, 6:2. It was a fairly easy game although Max Mirnyi had won against Kuerten, Ivanisevic, Sampras, and Kafelnikov in the previous rounds.

Obviously Mirnyi isn't able to play his best tennis against me. Well, this is okay with me... I can somehow read his game easily. Max and I have been knowing each other for ages. He too came to Bollettieri's Academy in 1991.

Losing is never fun but sometimes it is extremely hard

Losing against Agassi, Hewitt, Safin, Ferrero, or Kuerten on sand can always happen, no question. Sometimes this is not a result of you playing badly but of them playing their best tennis and doing really well. It is much harder to lose against players which you could beat. And where your chances before the game seemed to be pretty good.

Tim Henman and Yevgeny Kafelnikov are two of these players. In the past, they have given me some hard times. Especially Kafelnikov seems to love playing me. Some very important matches of my career were against him - the semi finals at the Australian Open in 1999, and the finals at the Olympic Summer Games in Sydney, 2000. Yevgeni has beaten me 5 times whereas I have only won twice. He is also the only one who has ever defeated me in the Davis Cup.