Daniil
Medvedev has extended his inconsistent form following losses at the
Laver Cup.
The former world No. 1 has lost prominence in recent weeks after early exits at
the Canadian Open and Cincinnati, along with a quarter-final defeat at the US
Open.
The current
world No. 5 lost both of his singles matches at the Laver Cup, despite entering
both matches as the favourite. On Saturday, he was defeated by
Frances Tiafoe,
and on Sunday, during the final day of competition, he once again fell to
Tiafoe, with both losses coming in the 10-point super tie-break.
During the
match against Shelton, he was involved in controversy after throwing his racket
into the crowd, leading to complaints from Team World, who expected his
disqualification. However, the umpire decided not to sanction the Russian:
"I didn’t want to throw my racket the way I did. I mean... I wanted to
throw it at one place, which is a bad gesture on my part,” he said. “I was
lucky. I did not touch anyone. When you don’t touch anyone, you’re not
disqualified. That’s all. I just think I shouldn’t have done that," he
explained after the match.
“I feel
like I have motivation in every tournament I play, but I could give you 10
different reasons or excuses why I lost each match. Before I didn’t like to
play five sets, every time they ask me I always say to play best of three, but
I know that maybe it will help me solve the problems my opponent proposes. I
hope to continue playing better in the Grand Slam and play a little better in
the rest of the tournaments".
"In
tennis it is important to think that a new opportunity will always come, even
if it is not always easy to believe in it. It also happens the other way
around, you may have won a Grand Slam or an ATP 500, but the next week losing
in the first round of a Masters 1000, at that time you already forgot your
title because of that defeat.”
“It’s
important to keep pushing, we play every week on this tour, or we’re all
traveling, training and moving forward. The harder your mind gets, usually the
more matches you lose, the more tournaments you lose in a row. We’ve seen this
in some players after the Olympics, how hard it is to push non-stop, so a good
mental advice would be this, try to avoid exhaustion and push every week".