'I don't think I have any regrets' - Konta on French Open loss
PARIS, France - There are two ways of viewing Johanna Konta's last-four run at Roland Garros 2019. On the one hand, the Briton lost a third Grand Slam semifinal in straight sets - and this time to an unseeded teenager in Marketa Vondrousova, not an established Top 10 player à la Angelique Kerber at the 2016 Australian Open or Venus Williams at Wimbledon 2017.
On the other, it capped a career renaissance over this year's clay swing that has seen Konta overturn a previous losing record on the surface to rack up finals in Rabat and Rome and a semifinal run at a major where she had never won a main draw match before, emerging with a 23-7 win-loss record and a return to the Top 20 on Monday.
It's the latter that the 28-year-old is holding on to. "There is nothing for me to be disappointed in or upset about," she asserted afterwards. "I mean, I lost a tennis match, but I also won five. I can only take the good things from that."
Konta was full of praise for her opponent's all-court talent: "I think she reads the game really well," she said. "With her being a lefty, she has that added variety... the way the ball comes back is going to be different than 95% of the time that we play matches out there. I think she competes really well, as well. There are very few drop-offs from how she plays... She asks you a lot of questions out there, and I think that's a real gift of hers."
Despite Vondrousova's undoubted skill - the Czech teenager's dropshot and lob came to the fore in particular at the business end of both sets - there were certainly moments where key points had been on Konta's racquet, such as the wild drive volley with which she squandered her first set point of three in the opening stanza. Nonetheless, there were no regrets here either.
"It's actually not that difficult [to get over], because I did the right thing," Konta pointed out. "There were certain things that also had a say in how those balls went. It was incredibly blustery out there. I took the opportunity to come in and take it out of the air, and that's what I would do nine times out of ten, and probably nine times out of ten it probably would go in, as well... To be honest, I feel very comfortable with how I played and what I tried to do out there. I don't think I have any regrets, really.
"I think my opponent played really well. I'm proud in how I tried to find a way out there. I'm proud in how I tried to work the points, how I tried to play out there against her. It just didn't go my way."
Next up for Konta is her grass swing, which she will enter with renewed expectations, as well as the question of whether she can progress beyond the semifinal stage of a major - perhaps at her home Slam of Wimbledon. The former World No.4 was typically sanguine about her prospects.
"There is no reason why I cannot [win a major]," she said. "I'm putting myself into positions to try to make that extra step and making into a final. It's either going to happen or it's not. I still have a lot to be proud of. Even if I were to stop playing tomorrow, I have done a lot of great things in my career so far. So I'm not at all disappointed in the player that I am or things that I have achieved. But equally, I'm just as hungry and just as motivated to keep going forward and to one day be in a position to be winning a major. I definitely believe in my ability to do that, and we'll see if it happens or not."
Konta enters the grass season on an upwards trajectory after her career-best clay season. "I don't feel like I came into this week trying to prove anything to anybody, including myself," she said. "I have been playing every tournament this season... for me and for my own enjoyment and development and belief in how I can get better. And I definitely felt I continued on that process, on that journey this fortnight in trying to be better, trying to play better, trying to just improve."
"I'm really pleased with how many tough matches I was able to come through. And even the tough matches that I lost, I really felt that I took a lot forward from each of those, and that would be including today."
