Fils shares his thoughts after loss to Mensik: "I couldn't push a little harder"

Arthur Fils will leave American soil with a record of two lost quarterfinals in Indian Wells and Miami, while inevitably feeling regret over today's defeat against Jakub Mensik.

The Frenchman, who had to play again less than 24 hours after his round of 16 match yesterday, admitted to *L'Équipe* that he couldn't find the physical and mental resources to stay in the fight:

"I'm disappointed, obviously, and very tired. I was a bit drained—I had to dig deep for energy, and I just couldn’t push a little harder. It wasn’t necessarily physical, more the mental energy, the focus slipping away.

In the tie-break, I lost it. It’s fatigue, and then you string together points, you don’t even know what you’re doing anymore, you stop following tactics, you see everything too late. It snowballs, and you completely lose track of the game. [...]

The scheduling wasn’t great. The ATP and the tournament handle it, but there are matches tonight that haven’t been played in two days. Meanwhile, I played yesterday and ended up first on court today."

The French No. 1 also looked ahead to the rest of the season, with clay court season approaching: "Clay is something I like, but I’ll need to be well-prepared to work on it.

Monte-Carlo is coming up fast, so I don’t even know where we’ll train, but I’ll have to get ready. I really want to have a strong clay season and finish strong at Roland-Garros."