Hubert Hurkacz moved to within two wins of retaining his Miami Open presented by Itau title on Thursday as he ended Daniil Medvedev’s World No. 1 bid in empathic fashion on Hard Rock Stadium.
In a tight quarter-final battle, the Pole produced an intense and aggressive performance against Medvedev as he clubbed his groundstrokes and finished points at the net to triumph 7-6(7), 6-3 in two hours and two minutes.
Florida is not foreign to Hurkacz who spent a lot of time in the state training and preparing himself for a tennis career. He admitted as much saying:
“I have spent a lot of time in Florida, so I am used to the humidity. I think the conditions were in my favour today, so I tried to use them.”
On the match in particular he said:
“I think the return was crucial. I was able to make a lot of returns and get some free points on my serve, because having rallies with Daniil is fun, but they get long. It is good I was able to get some free points."
Asked whether he would like to face Alcaraz or Kecmanovic, Hurkacz briefly commented:
“Carlos has been playing some amazing tennis this year, only played good matches I think, so that would be super tough. But Kecmanovic played some super tennis in Indian Wells and he is now backing that up here in Miami. It will be interesting.”