Daniil Medvedev is a tennis player with whom there is never a dull moment. On Wednesday, July 3, the 2021 US Open champion made a comeback in his second round match at Wimbledon against Frenchman Alexandre Muller. Although this was not easy to do.
Medvedev was considered by experts to be the undisputed favourite of the meeting. Before the fight, the Russian’s chances of reaching the third round were estimated at about 95%. But Muller proved in the first set that this superiority is still too much.
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In the first game, when Medvedev served first, Muller was constantly in a position to catch up with him. However, the Russian was unable to confirm his advantage with a break. Daniil even missed a set point on reception. During the match he continued to loudly communicate with his team, and in the tie-break, losing 3-6, he mistakenly opted for a transition. The umpire hinted to him that he needed to play, but the tennis player did not immediately understand what was happening. Recall that in the 13th game the sides are changed after every sixth draw, i.e. after the 6th, 12th point and so on.
“Watch Daniil Medvedev miscount points in a tie-break and sit down thinking it’s the end of the set, only to realise there’s more to play for! Don’t worry, Daniel, we’ve all been there!” — the Wimbledon press service signed the corresponding video.
This episode was immediately turned into a meme on the Internet. In the stands, spectators and even Gilles Cervara, Medvedev’s coach, laughed good-naturedly. And the Straits Times published an article today with the headline “Umpire saves Daniil Medvedev after Russian forgets score at Wimbledon.”
Medvedev lost this tie-break in the next draw. Fortunately, Daniil managed not to break down and took the next three sets: 6:7 (3:7), 7:6 (7:4), 6:4, 7:5. After the match, the Russian tennis player commented on his funny mistake. “At the end of the first set I had bad thoughts. With the score 3:6 in the tie-break I thought I had lost the set and went home. The umpire told me “6:3, 6:3, 6:3”, but I didn’t even hear him.
“Then I saw the check. I don’t know if this has happened to me before. I thought it was quite funny. I thought, ‘Okay, maybe this is my second chance to win. ’ And then I lost a point,” Medvedev said in an on-court interview.
And in the post-match press conference, Daniil explained in detail why not everything went his way in the first set. “For some reason, this court seems much slower, very slow bounces. It’s not the kind of grass where the ball slides. You have to get used to this.
It is more difficult to hit the ball on grass because it slides along the court. Novak [Джокович] “He is very good at this, his serve slides a lot on grass, it is hard to receive it. But my serve slides hard and my opponents find it difficult to accept it. For some reason, on grass, my serve does not slide as well as other players. I work hard on it, sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t,” he said.
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In the third round, Medvedev will play German Jan-Lennard Struff, the 41st ranked player in the world. Of the six previous encounters at ATP level, the Russian won five. However, Daniel suffered his only defeat on grass – in Halle. After that, however, Medvedev defeated Struff twice – all three meetings took place in 2021. Each of the two matches on grass had a tie-break. And whoever won, moved on. This means that Daniel needs to keep a cool head. In the second half of the match against Müller he showed that he is quite capable. Just so he doesn’t make any mistakes in the tie-break!
