Daniil Medvedev follows Federer, Nadal, Djokovic, Murray on exclusive list
The 23-year-old Russian Daniil Medvedev has been one of the best players of the season so far alongside Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer, making great progress in his game and entering the top-4. Daniil is the leader of the pack with 54 ATP wins and eight finals, shifting his game to another level after Wimbledon to enter the record books and establish himself as the player to beat at the moment. Following that tight loss to David Goffin in the third round at the All England Club, Daniil conquered 24 out of 27 encounters, rattling off five straight ATP finals to join an exclusive list of players who did that before him.
Switching to hard courts, Medvedev scored four wins in Washington before losing to Nick Kyrgios in two tie breaks, heading to Montreal where he played on an even higher level to reach the first Masters 1000 final, taking just three games against Rafael Nadal after losing steam. After two great weeks, the Russian decided to gather energy and try to play Cincinnati as well, toppling six rivals (world no. 1 Novak Djokovic in the semis) to lift the first Masters 1000 crown and become the first player from his country with the title at this level in ten years. Taking a much-needed week off after three challenging but productive events, Daniil was one of the dark horses in New York, playing with high confidence but not much energy left in his body.
Despite all the obstacles, Medvedev had survived the first five matches without having to play a decider before ousting Grigor Dimitrov in the semi-final to reach the fourth straight title match that he lost to Rafael Nadal after giving his 200% and gathering sympathies from the entire tennis world. Two weeks later, Daniil shined at home in St. Petersburg to win the third title of the season and become only the fifth active player with five consecutive ATP finals, joining Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray. Also, Daniil is the 23rd player in the Open era to achieve this and only the fifth after Goran Ivanisevic who did that in 1996, adding his name to the special list and hoping for more of the same in the remaining event of the season after deciding to skip Beijing and take more rest.
from Tennis World USA https://ift.tt/2npZgtz
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