A. ZVEREV/A. Blockx
6-1, 6-4
THE MODERATOR: Questions.
Q. Thoughts on the match?
ALEXANDER ZVEREV: Well, a good match. I felt better than I did two days ago. The energy started coming back. Definitely much better match than it was two days ago. Yeah, happy the way I won also.
Q. The conditions were difficult?
ALEXANDER ZVEREV: Yeah, difficult. Very, very windy. Especially in the second set got very windy. Before the rain it got very windy. I'm lucky that I finished in time.
Yeah, not easy to play pretty tennis. I was efficient today. Winning in straight sets is very nice.
Q. What did you make of your opponent? Had a great couple of weeks.
ALEXANDER ZVEREV: Yeah, he's very hot right now. He's somebody that has a lot of power, is very powerful. Has a great serve. Has great power from the baseline. I think there's still a lot of things that he can improve. I think he knows that.
But yeah, he has a great future ahead of him, I think.
Q. I was watching your average second-serve speed. This match was a little bit higher. I was wondering, how do you take maybe these decisions of risking a little bit more in the second serve?
ALEXANDER ZVEREV: I didn't feel like I was risking. Sometimes your arm is a bit looser and the ball just goes. It was not intentional.
I think my second-serve speed generally is quite high throughout the entire year. Sometimes it's a bit more, sometimes a bit less. I didn't know that, so yeah...
Q. You have different upcoming players and at the same time you have being on the top. In your tennis, it's concentrating on the things you have to do to beat the top guys or every day to improve your tennis?
ALEXANDER ZVEREV: You have to improve every day. Of course, there's a special focus on the top guys. There's certain practices you do just for them. Yeah, maybe right now they're not working too well for me (smiling). There's still those practices where you train for the top guys.
Of course, in general, you always try to improve, you always try to get better every chance you get. I've been on tour for a long time. I still feel like I improve and I can improve every year. I think if you don't, you kind of go backwards.
Q. Who do you think your biggest threat is now on the way to the final?
ALEXANDER ZVEREV: There's young guys who are playing great tennis. Prizmic is definitely one of them that is playing great tennis. There are the guys that we know about. It will be very interesting between Musetti and Cerundolo, two very good players on the clay court.
I'm going to go match by match. That's the most important thing, not to look too far ahead, focus on the things that you can control.
Last week Blockx was in the semifinals. He beat everybody. He bet Casper Ruud, Felix, all the favorites to go to the semifinal. In tennis you never know. Each week is different. I just focus on the opponents that are in front of me.
Q. Doing specific things for specific players, no Carlos in the picture right now. How much difference does that make to the calculus for yourself and other players?
ALEXANDER ZVEREV: I mean, I think the biggest difference is probably makes for Jannik because he's now really, really the heavy favorite. Carlos on a clay court when he's healthy, equal or even above Jannik in favoritism just purely on a clay court, especially at Roland Garros, being a two-time champion there already.
But for me, I got to focus on the things that I can control and try to improve again to try to beat Jannik. That's the important thing.
Getting there is also important, right? You can't talk about someone you might face in the finals before winning the first six matches.
For me again, it's about focusing on the opponents in front of me at the moment.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports