Vladimir Putin

Have you read the things that were published in Moskovskiye Novosti and Ogonyok in those days? For instance, General Kalugin’s exposures? Kalugin is a traitor. I saw Kalugin during my time in Leningrad when he was deputy head of the Directorate. He was an absolute loafer. A loafer, perhaps, but he remembers you. He doesn’t remember anything. He does remember, and he says that from the point of view of the intelligence service, you worked in a province and had nothing to show for your performance. Oh, he doesn’t remember a thing. He couldn’t remember me. I had no contact with him, nor did I meet him. It is I who remembers him, because he was a big boss and everybody knew him. As to whether he knew me, there were hundreds of us.

Nobody should pin their hopes on a miracle.

My parents told me that children were taken from their families in 1941, and my mother had a child taken from her – with the goal of saving him.

No one should be allowed to violently trample on the law.

Even if we do not always agree on every aspect, nobody should take this as an excuse to declare us as enemies.

For Russia, there is not and there may not be another political option but democracy. However, Russian democracy is… not at all the realization of standards imposed on us from outside.

Tennis is beautiful when you can see tactics, when players don’t just react but are able to act and think.

Is more for precaution. You don’t know tomorrow what’s happen, no? But now I am happy because I don’t feel too much pain. But I can finish the match, so that’s a good sign.

You fight, you try your best, but if you lose, you don’t have to break five racquets and smash up the locker room. You can do those things, but when you’ve finished, nothing’s changed. You’ve still lost. If something positive came from that, I probably would do it. But I see only negativity.

I learned during all my career to enjoy suffering.

When one player is better than you, at this moment, the only thing you can do is work, try to find solutions and try to wait a little bit for your time. I’m going to wait and I’m going to try a sixth time. And if the sixth doesn’t happen, a seventh. It’s going to be like this. That’s the spirit of sport.

Something that works for one person could be a disadvantage to another.

Since I was a kid, I’ve wanted to do sports for a living. In the beginning, I played a lot of soccer, but in the end I chose tennis. I love sports in general … But tennis is my passion.

I’m only superstitious on the tennis court.

You can swim any way you like in the Dead Sea, actually.

My tennis is aggressive, though I wouldn’t say that it’s more physical than technical. I rely more on technique than physique, but being physical is always a help to me.

I doubt about myself. I think doubts are good in life. The people who don’t have doubts I think only two things-arrogance or not intelligence.

My goal is to improve my game, stay healthy and be competitive. If I have that, I know I can be able to win tournaments, which in the end is what it counts.

For sure, with golf it’s not a physically demanding sport like tennis. That’s what makes tennis great – you combine both things. It’s a very mental sport and at the same time can be dramatically physical. But I do admire the mentality of sport more than the physicality because physical performance is much easier to practice than mental performance.

It’s already a great feeling to be third on the list. To get past Borg, I will have to reach the final in Barcelona next week. It won?t be easy. I could lose any day. But if I am 100 per cent I know I have a great chance of winning.

I like a lot of sports. Especially football – it’s my favourite sport. My uncle played football in Barcelona for nine years and played for Spain in three World Cups.