Safin談Agassi - 網球

Q. Years from now when you're old and have grey hair, your grandkids ask you
to tell them a story about great Andre Agassi, what story would you tell them?

MARAT SAFIN: Well, I think it's the first guy who made tennis a show and
entertainment. Of course, he achieved a lot of Grand Slams and everything,
but he made this entertainment with his looks, with his pants, with the
fashion that he brought into tennis. The people start to be a little bit with
the glasses he played, first guy who played with glasses, I think, short
hair, long hair, earrings. What he's missing, tattoos. But he made a show on
the court actually. He had such charisma. Also in the same way he could
concentrate on what he was doing. He keeped his level of tennis during 15
years he's been on the tour, even more, 18 years that he's been on the tour.
He's been there all the time top 10, top two, top three. He had only one
slip. One year, I don't remember which was it, '97 I guess, '96, something
like that. Well, he slipped a little bit, but he could come back from being
150 in the world and playing challengers, come back and I think he's been No.
1 in the world afterwards.

Q. You said entertainment, personality is so important in tennis. Can we
replace Agassi?

MARAT SAFIN: No, because he's a personality. You cannot replace personality
with another personality. It can be a different story, different guy has to
be. The second one who tries to copy him will never be the same, that's for
sure. It's going to be who will take a place and who will try to be as close
as him. But I think they should be doing it in a different way. Well, of
course we have Federer, we have Roddick, we have Hewitt. But of course Agassi
is Agassi. It's like a brand already. Andre Agassi, you already know what
you're talking about, you know what to expect. Compared to him, we are kids.
We have to learn much more in our lives to be able to get there.



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