Alycia Parks Press Conference | Australian Open 2024 Second Round

Alycia Parks’ press conference following her win against Leylah Fernandez in the second round of the Australian Open 2024.

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Welcome to the official Australian Open TV YouTube channel. The Australian Open 2024 main draw runs from 14-28 January in Melbourne. The tournament takes place for the 112th time and is the first Grand Slam of the year. Novak Djokovic is the men’s singles reigning champion and Aryna Sabalenka is the women’s singles reigning champion. The tournament takes place on 25 hard courts, including Rod Laver Arena, Margaret Court Arena and John Cain Arena. Look out for highlights, press conferences, memorable moments and much more!

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So welcome to Alicia’s Parks press conference Alicia congrats on the win today how do you feel about your performance so far and you moving on to the third round of the Australian Open um I feel pretty good um the first set was a little tough I didn’t really feel

Myself out there I got down 41 pretty quick um but I don’t know something told me to just lock back in and then take it Point by point and then I end up coming back 75 and set so Alicia congrats on the win um in terms of turning that match around when

You say that you were locking back in what did that mean game wise for you was that like focusing on the serve focusing on your footwork like what does it mean to get you locked back into a match um I think I was kind of rushing in the first

Set a little bit especially on my serve uh my serve is definitely one of my best weapons so I just had to tell myself to slow down breathe and I don’t know like Focus toss is like the biggest thing for me so once I started to get my serve

Back then I started to get back in Rhythm and then that’s how I turn the match around um Alicia can you tell us the I don’t know if there’s like a backstory to your coaching situation here and how I I don’t think you have been working

With Mark for very long so how did that unfold for you yes um Mark has been working with me this week um it’s kind of new he was going well he’s helping me out for Australian Open and hopefully in the future so I think we’re a good partnership and we look forward to

Working together the future did you guys like just in the last few days you started working together yes um he flew in I think Friday Thursday night or Friday and then we had like one day to like prep and then I don’t know we’re in a third round so I think we’re doing

Pretty good together yeah congratulations um we just talking to coko and you obviously play her next just and she said that you known each other for years just what what are your kind of memories of of hitting with her in Florida when you were younger can’t really hear you what I

Said what are your memories of hitting with coko when you were younger um that was so long ago I don’t really remember the training part I just remember like practicing the next court over from her so I think this match will be obviously it’s our first meeting I think

It would be a fun match so yeah just in terms of of looking ahead to to facing Coco what excites you the most about this match third round off joint open facing the reigning US Open Champion is Coco like you guys have known each other for so long but what

Gets you I don’t know when you think about it what gets you excited about it I think both of us are doing actually pretty well so I know everyone else wants to see like the matchup but I think it’s pretty good to you know run across her in the slam um

Third round so I mean I guess we’re both going to go out there and play our games and see where it goes um hia um coko just mentioned earlier that she looks to likes of jovic’s and Serena’s practices over the years to fine-tune her own game are there any

Players in the time you’ve been on tour or in in the Juniors even that that made you stop and watch their practices um I would say not so much practices I like to watch Serena’s matches which I actually ran across one of her matches maybe maybe like two days

Ago um um but I think Serena yeah I like to watch her matches a lot any in particular that come to mind um no I just like to see how she is like on the court and in certain situations so if I’m ever in that situation to you know feed off of that

And yeah bringing it to my own match when you were younger you you didn’t play much Junior competition curious like did you always believe that you were capable of you know getting to this point and and you know without kind of measuring up against people your

Age yes my dad took me out of the Juniors only because I was growing so fast and he didn’t want me to get injured and he wanted me to develop so I mean I always wanted to go pro and that was the goal ever since I picked up the racket

So I so I think it it panned out well um and I wouldn’t take any different route how quickly did you grow and what that was like when when you were younger you know growing quickly and and like and like playing tennis and you know adjusting to your

Game I don’t really understand the question like like what was it like you said you grow grew really quickly what was that like um in terms of your game how did that look did that change much in your game did did your changer tool

Or you know no um my dad he was always my coach growing up we just practiced a lot on technique um kind of like a machine we did the same drills almost every day so I think now that it took me a while to get into playing matches um so yeah I don’t

Know Alicia are you someone who like tends to like the big stage you’ve been kind of on these secondary but big chords so far and going to guess against Coco you’ll be on a pretty pretty big Court how do you um approach that sort of situation and do you like go inward

Back to any like breathing techniques or listen to music or anything to get yourself ready for something like that I would say I’m actually better on the bigger courts um only because it puts me in a more like serious Zone which may sound weird um but I definitely play

Like one song um and then I walk on the court and then obviously the crowd but then I just stay in my own tunnel and just focus and see what I can can control out there and yeah so what’s the song yeah what’s the song Come

On the song is the last song I posted on my video after the first round that I’ve been listening to yes just talking about Serena um seems like a goofy question because it’s Serena but in your own words when you watch her what do you what do you see

Like what does it what resonates with you so much as being the player that you want to absorb stuff from I would say definitely her calmness when she’s in certain situations when things are going too fast she’ll actually like slow down and rethink um her serve is definitely one of her weapons

So I kind of just look at her serve and then be like okay if she’s in trouble then she’ll come back on her service game and um I’m trying to think what else yeah I don’t know just the way she carried herself on the court uh she’s

Very focused um she doesn’t like rush so I tend to rush a little bit and then usually that’s when I start to kind of snowball so I have to slow it down and take it Point by point was there a moment in uh in that match against Daria sneer she’s was a

Tough matchup and she plays such quirky tennis um I think you had lost the first set and then things were pretty tricky what was the mentality there and are you have you surprised Yourself by escaping that and now getting into the third round or when you think back to the

First round goes into your mind yes the first set I was not expecting that I think it was more of well nerves played a big part in that for the match only because it’s the first round of a slam that’s the first thing and it takes me a

Little time to kind of warm up a little bit and then her balls were a little tricky the way they were bouncing so I had to you know adjust and kind of hug the Baseline and cut the ball off off on the return so then that helped me turn the match around thank You