Daniil Medvedev lost to Jannik Sinner in the final of the season and his favourite Slam, which he had already won: the US Open. At a press conference, the Russian tennis player tried to understand the reasons for the defeat in this chaotic match and summed up his season in the majors.
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“Was the result decided on a break point when the score was 3:2”? Reaction to Medvedev’s disappointing US Open defeat
“At some point I got lost in my mistakes”
– Big defeat. I’m not happy with my performance overall because there were some good moments and some not so good ones. Overall a feeling of heaviness. I rarely feel tense, but today at the end of the match I was very tense. Because when I didn’t hit, I didn’t understand why I didn’t hit and I couldn’t correct it.
And at the end I felt very pressured. Yes, even more difficult. This is a difficult feeling, I am dissatisfied with myself. But this is tennis, that is normal. I lost and I am going home.
— The match was chaotic, the initiative constantly passed from one player to the other. How did you feel on the pitch? Why did the match turn out like that? — This happens in tennis, sometimes you don’t know the exact reason. It could be anything. I mean, he plays well, it could be the way he hits the ball. Yeah, a lot of everything. I still don’t have an answer, and I probably never will, as to why exactly this happened.
Yes, there were transitions of initiative. If I look for something positive, the first set was terrible for me, almost worse than the third. I managed to solve a lot of problems in the second set and started to play better. And in the fourth set I started to solve some problems that I had in the third set. This is something positive. The negative is that I couldn’t solve them until that moment. It’s always better when you don’t have problems and you don’t have to solve them.
So I don’t know exactly why, but it wasn’t my best match. In fact, I think his match isn’t the best either, he missed a bit here and there. But he won, which means he was better.
— There was a feeling that either you played well but he didn’t, but on the contrary, there was a real swing. Did your game with him affect your level with him in any way? – Don’t think. I have another theory. I saw it here in training a week before the tournament. Balls, courts, not everything was easy. The same thing happened in Montreal and Cincinnati. It’s not very easy to control them. And sometimes you feel like you’re doing everything right, but you don’t understand it, so you start asking questions and so on. But before the match I was more confident that I could win this match even if I missed some shots. And today I take a little more risky shots. I almost missed and at some point I got lost in my mistakes. Maybe it was the same for him, because I still managed to get him into trouble more than once, even if it wasn’t enough. This is my theory.
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“It was a pretty good Grand Slam season for me.”
— What do you think of your Grand Slam season as a whole and how do you compare to Carlos, Yannick and Novak? — The Slam season was pretty good. Roland Garros and Wimbledon are not the easiest tournaments for me. Quite good results: fourth round, semi-finals. The Australian Open and the US Open are my biggest hopes and I lost to the same opponent in both. But, taking into account all the details, I came here without confidence after Montreal and Cincinnati, and at the Australian Open I tried to start the season right away, practically won and made several crazy comebacks. I think it was a good Slam season. Maybe I should have done better in other tournaments, but I still have a chance. There are still four or five tournaments left.
— This year you played Yannick three times at the Slams, and each time it was at least four sets. Tell us what it’s like to play against him now. – Tough. He is one of the best players in the world, usually the highest rated player, and he deserves it. It is difficult to play against him, he has a good sense of the game. He often chooses the right shot at the right time. I really like playing against players like that, where every point counts and then on break point you wonder what he is going to do and how you can counter it. I think all these matches were interesting in their own way, they were liked by the crowd. I will be happy to play against him again in Grand Slams.
—What do you think about your confrontation? “It’s been tough for me lately, but if you compare today’s match to the other matches this year, when he started to beat me, then I think I did the right thing. I think we came out of this match thinking: OK, now I understand what he’s doing. Well, the only difference is that I lost and he won, so it feels better.
I like it. Such important matches always make me strive to be better. Sometimes I lose, sometimes I win. I will try to be better next time, that’s the only thing I can do.
—Don’t you think that you have younger and more principled opponents, and that the offseason should be used to prepare for these opponents? — I would like to say yes, but the off-season is usually about two weeks. The only thing I can say is that really, usually after the off-season I start the season well. This is the only time of the year when you have two, sometimes three weeks, to prepare; this is not the case during the season. The maximum can be two after Wimbledon, if there are no Olympic Games. And it is still a bit different.
That’s why I always work hard. As for the opponents, the opponents have always been tough. Before there was Rafa, Roger, Novak, now there are Carlos, Yannick. Some of the other guys just have to practice a lot and try to improve their game and try to beat them. That’s all.
