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CNN Live Sunday
Interview With Rachel Nichols
Aired July 06, 2003 - 18:52 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KELLI ARENA, CNN ANCHOR: We're turning our attention now to England where there is a new Wimbledon champion. Roger Federer won the men's final today beating Mark Philippoussis in straight sets. He's the first Swiss man to win a major tennis title.
Well, let's ask an expert about this year's Wimbledon. Rachel Nichols is a sports writer for "The Washington Post." She's been covering the tournament and joins us from London, Rachel good to have you with us.
RACHEL NICHOLS, "WASHINGTON POST": Hey, there, how you doing?
ARENA: All right. Well, we heard it was a very emotional win for Roger Federer. Tell us what it was like.
NICHOLS: It was amazing because Roger plays with such a passive mask on his face. He sweats and he sort of looks like a Swiss watch. He's very precise and you don't really know if he's even trying out there when he plays, but once he won today, God, everything just erupted.
He started crying on the court. He started crying when he accepted his trophy. He started crying on the Duke of Kent. He was crying everywhere and he said this was just his dream since he was a little boy.
ARENA: Well, he's 21 years old so this is astounding, a great future ahead of him.
NICHOLS: Absolutely. He's a beautiful player. I mean his stroke. He's a tennis player's tennis player. It's just artistry out there and, as I said, his personality isn't as exciting as maybe an Andre Agassi. He hasn't really captured the world's attention but I think when people see him play they're going to get pretty excited because he really is beautiful to watch and he makes these shots that you just can't believe.
ARENA: And then, of course, we saw the Williams sisters go head- to-head again, anything striking about that? I mean obviously we've seen this before.
NICHOLS: Drama, exactly. You know it's one of those things where you have a rivalry like this and when it's the same two people over and over again and especially if the same person keeps winning the way it eventually happened with Chris and Martina, where Martina took over and kept winning and winning. It can get kind of boring. The Williams sisters, however, make sure there is always drama going on. They will keep you interested so the drama started for this time on Thursday during the semi-finals. Serena had already played here semi-final and won and advanced to the final and she was actually in the stands watching Venus play when Venus pulled an abdominal muscle. She actually aggravated an old injury.
So, there was a rain delay and Venus was already down a set. Serena goes to the locker room, says Venus you got to play through this. You got to make this injury go away. She's actually telling her future opponent that she's got to come play here in the finals.
Venus gets there and, of course, they had the melodrama on Saturday where Venus played injured. Serena had a hard time attacking the woman she'd just been encouraging two days before but eventually she did triumph in the end in three sets.
ARENA: Well, another story in the women's match is Martina Navratilova, her 20th Wimbledon title.
NICHOLS: Absolutely.
ARENA: Awesome.
NICHOLS: Twentieth Wimbledon title, she's 46 years old. She said it's great because she has people coming up telling her who are 16 years old, I never saw you play but I saw you on "The Muppets" when I was a little kid and you're awesome.
She has skiers on the ski lifts of Aspen where she lives saying, yes dude, rock on, and she's also got all these great country club women in their 50s and 60s saying that she's their hero.
She's, you know, get out there and she stayed in such great shape and she really is an inspiration to a lot of people including Leander Paes who was her mixed doubles partner today. He said I am the vehicle to help Martina achieve these great things, so they drove pretty fast today.
ARENA: Well, Rachel Nichols at "The Washington Post" thanks for taking the time to join us.
NICHOLS: Thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired July 6, 2003 - 18:52 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KELLI ARENA, CNN ANCHOR: We're turning our attention now to England where there is a new Wimbledon champion. Roger Federer won the men's final today beating Mark Philippoussis in straight sets. He's the first Swiss man to win a major tennis title.
Well, let's ask an expert about this year's Wimbledon. Rachel Nichols is a sports writer for "The Washington Post." She's been covering the tournament and joins us from London, Rachel good to have you with us.
RACHEL NICHOLS, "WASHINGTON POST": Hey, there, how you doing?
ARENA: All right. Well, we heard it was a very emotional win for Roger Federer. Tell us what it was like.
NICHOLS: It was amazing because Roger plays with such a passive mask on his face. He sweats and he sort of looks like a Swiss watch. He's very precise and you don't really know if he's even trying out there when he plays, but once he won today, God, everything just erupted.
He started crying on the court. He started crying when he accepted his trophy. He started crying on the Duke of Kent. He was crying everywhere and he said this was just his dream since he was a little boy.
ARENA: Well, he's 21 years old so this is astounding, a great future ahead of him.
NICHOLS: Absolutely. He's a beautiful player. I mean his stroke. He's a tennis player's tennis player. It's just artistry out there and, as I said, his personality isn't as exciting as maybe an Andre Agassi. He hasn't really captured the world's attention but I think when people see him play they're going to get pretty excited because he really is beautiful to watch and he makes these shots that you just can't believe.
ARENA: And then, of course, we saw the Williams sisters go head- to-head again, anything striking about that? I mean obviously we've seen this before.
NICHOLS: Drama, exactly. You know it's one of those things where you have a rivalry like this and when it's the same two people over and over again and especially if the same person keeps winning the way it eventually happened with Chris and Martina, where Martina took over and kept winning and winning. It can get kind of boring. The Williams sisters, however, make sure there is always drama going on. They will keep you interested so the drama started for this time on Thursday during the semi-finals. Serena had already played here semi-final and won and advanced to the final and she was actually in the stands watching Venus play when Venus pulled an abdominal muscle. She actually aggravated an old injury.
So, there was a rain delay and Venus was already down a set. Serena goes to the locker room, says Venus you got to play through this. You got to make this injury go away. She's actually telling her future opponent that she's got to come play here in the finals.
Venus gets there and, of course, they had the melodrama on Saturday where Venus played injured. Serena had a hard time attacking the woman she'd just been encouraging two days before but eventually she did triumph in the end in three sets.
ARENA: Well, another story in the women's match is Martina Navratilova, her 20th Wimbledon title.
NICHOLS: Absolutely.
ARENA: Awesome.
NICHOLS: Twentieth Wimbledon title, she's 46 years old. She said it's great because she has people coming up telling her who are 16 years old, I never saw you play but I saw you on "The Muppets" when I was a little kid and you're awesome.
She has skiers on the ski lifts of Aspen where she lives saying, yes dude, rock on, and she's also got all these great country club women in their 50s and 60s saying that she's their hero.
She's, you know, get out there and she stayed in such great shape and she really is an inspiration to a lot of people including Leander Paes who was her mixed doubles partner today. He said I am the vehicle to help Martina achieve these great things, so they drove pretty fast today.
ARENA: Well, Rachel Nichols at "The Washington Post" thanks for taking the time to join us.
NICHOLS: Thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
