Medvedev defeated Thiem and celebrates the most valuable triumph at the Champions Tournament

Daniil Medvedev he went into decline for a few weeks after the US Open, but at the end of the season he found great form and ended it with a series of ten wins and a triumph of his life.

Two weeks after winning the Masters 1000 in Paris, the 24-year-old Russian also won the prestigious Champions Tournament. While he lost all three matches in the group in his debut last year in London, this year he did not find a winner in five matches.

Medvedev was not stopped last year’s champion German Alexander Zverev, Argentine rookie Diego Schwartzman or the three best tennis players of today: Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Dominic Thiem.

After turning over a tie-break fight with Nadal yesterday, Medvedev also dealt with the three-year-younger Austrian Thiem in a similar way in today’s final, whom he defeated after 2 hours and 42 minutes of fighting 4-6 7-6 6-4 and mutual balance. adjusted to 2-3. He defeated the Top 10 players for the seventh time in a row.

As in the semifinals, Medvedev started more slowly with Nadal. He made more mistakes than this year’s Thiem and lost service in the first set in the fifth game. Although he already led 40-0 in it, he also put a smash into the net and made a double mistake during breakball.

The Russian did not save the first set and the balanced second decided in a tie-break, in which he gained seven points in a row from 0-2. He has been better on the court since then. At 1-1 in the third set, he has not used any of the three breakballs, but succeeded at 3-2. He took Thiem’s ​​service for the first time and no longer hesitated.

The O2 Arena was played because of the coronavirus without spectators, and Medvedev did not even rejoice after winning. He just walked to the net, waiting for Thiem to shake his hand. He clenched his fist triumphantly a moment later at the call of a cameraman.

“It was a great match, one of my best against a great opponent,” Medvedev said at the ceremony, who as an undefeated winner in London, he earned $ 1.564 million, in terms of over 34.7 million crowns.

Medvedev became the first tennis player to beat all three current Top 3 players in the Champions Tournament. So far, only three players have succeeded in history at the ATP circuit: Boris Becker in Stockholm 1994, Djokovic in Montreal 2017 and David Nalbandian in Madrid 2017.

The finalist of last year’s US Open Medvedev won the 10th title in his 15th final overall. The Cup for the winners of the Champions Tournament will place three trophies from the Masters 1000 events (Cincinnati 2019, Shanghai 2019 and Paris 2020).

Medvedev has become the sixth other winner of the final event of the season in the last six years. This happened only in the seasons 1974-1979 (Vilas, Nastase, Orantes, Connors, McEnroe, Borg). This year, the tournament met a new champion for the fifth year in a row.

Singles champions in London

09: Davydenko
10: Federer
11: Federer
12: Djokovic
13: Djokovic
14: Djokovic
15: Djokovic
16: Murray
17: Dimitrov
18: Zverev
19: Tsitsipas
20: Medvedev@DaniilMedwed #NittoATPFinals pic.twitter.com/Ld2iETrLq8

— ATP Tour (@atptour) November 22, 2020

Thiem, 27, who won his first grand slam title at the US Open two months ago, played the final of the Champions Tournament for the second year in a row, but lost again. Last year he fell in three sets with Stefanos Tsitsipas.

“Of course I’m disappointed, but at the same time proud of myself, because I played great all week,” said Thiem.

The champions tournament was played for the twelfth and last time in London. The first and last year in the capital of Great Britain was won by the only Russian champions, in 2009 Nikolai Davydenko triumphed. Next year, the tournament will take place in Turin, Italy.

They triumphed in doubles The Dutchman Wesley Koolhof and the Croatian Nikola Mektič, who were the first in history to win the first joint title at the Champions Tournament.

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