TURIN, Italy – Daniil Medvedev, tired and at the end of his nerves, experienced one of those mental implosions that punctuate his career, before losing to Taylor Fritz, winner 6-4, 6-3 in the first match of the 2024 ATP Finals on Sunday.
Medvedev, winner of the “masters tournament” in 2020 and finalist of the 2021 edition, lost his footing at the end of the first set, conceding the first round with a series of three double faults.
The world No. 4, who had been eliminated as soon as he entered the competition at the Masters 1000 in Paris, came back to his senses at the start of the second set, before giving up his serve to be led 4-2 and exploding once again under the whistles from spectators at the Inalpi Arena.
While he had already broken his racket at the end of the first set, he then completely lost his footing: he received a penalty point for swinging his racket and breaking a microphone capturing ambient sounds at the edge of the court. course.
The 2024 Australian Open finalist then threw his racket in the air between each point of his opponent’s service, even pretending to want to return a serve from Fritz by taking his racket by the sieve.
“I don’t know why I’m doing this, I don’t expect anything from it, I was angry and frustrated, with myself, not with anyone,” he explained at a press conference.
“I don’t care”
“When he breaks at 4-2, it’s hard to swallow, the ball takes a funny bounce on the line, I said to myself: ‘I lost the match, I don’t care’. We just had to finish the match,” continued the Russian.
To reach the final four, Medvedev no longer has the right to make mistakes and must beat his next two opponents, the Italian Jannik Sinner, world No. 1 and big favorite, and the Australian Alex De Minaur.
“I’m going to try to play better, if it doesn’t work, I’ll be happy to be eliminated, if it works, I’ll be happy to still be in the running,” he said.
“I’m tired of fighting against something that doesn’t depend on me, we’ll see what happens […] If it doesn’t work, I’ll be on vacation and I’ll be happy,” said the Russian, whose season is clearly on a downward slope since his defeat in the Wimbledon semi-final against Carlos Alcaraz.
For his part, Fritz, who is participating in the ATP Finals for the second time in his career, was pleased to have managed to remain consistent in his service under these circumstances.
“My service was the key, he is someone who returns very well, I offered myself on my service games without too much pressure, which allowed me to concentrate on his service games,” said estimated the American who had reached the last four for his first participation in 2022.
The other meeting of this group “Ilie Nastase” will pit Sinner against De Minaur in the evening.
