Medvedev effortlessly cracked down on Alcaraz. And plenty of mocked at the fans!

Russian Daniil Medvedev is approaching the semi-finals of the US Open-2023 with the Spaniard Carlos Alcaras as an outsider. Experts and bookmakers can be understood, because Daniil is opposed by the best player on the planet at the moment.

Surprisingly, two years ago, Medvedev was considered the clear favorite in the match with the Spaniard and easily confirmed the forecasts, while mocking the stands.

Russian is the favorite

Both tennis players started their journey at Wimbledon 2021 with difficult victories. Medvedev, seeded at the tournament under the second number, defeated Jan-Lennard Struff from Germany in four sets. Alcaraz played out to five games at all – the Spaniard, who received a wild card from the organizers, barely coped with the Japanese Yasutaka Uchiyama.

In the second round, Daniel and Carlos faced each other. Before that, there were no face-to-face matches in their career. All forecasts were on the side of the Russian – 18-year-old Carlos then occupied a place in the eighth top ten of the ATP rating and, with all his desire, could not be considered as a favorite.

All that the Spaniard could count on was a tight fight with a more eminent opponent. But in reality it didn’t work out.

Games with stands

Medvedev was almost flawless on his serve. In the first set, he lost only five points – however, he still gave up one of his games. But Alcaraz could not develop the advantage and actually gave Daniil two breaks. As a result – 6:4 in favor of the Russian.

Further events showed that the first set was the most intense in the entire match. Medvedev turned on the berserk mode and simply crushed Alcaraz. The Spaniard looked good except in some episodes – in general, it seemed that he was not ready for an opponent of this level. Daniil calmly took two sets with a score of 6:1, 6:2 and stepped into the third round. He spent a little over an hour and a half for the entire match.

Daniil Medvedev / Photo: © Julian Finney / Staff / Getty Images Sport / Gettyimages.ru

At the same time, Medvedev had to cope not only with Alcaraz’s attempts to win back, but also with the public. The audience supported the Spaniard in every possible way, and they reacted coldly to the successful actions of the Russian. In response, Daniel teased them: he put his hand to his ear, called to root for him and extremely emotionally noted the points scored. However, he did not celebrate the winning ball, only shaking hands with the opponent and the referee.

Predictions came true

Despite the defeat, Medvedev praised the performance of Alcaraz.

“Carlos is an amazing player, I am sure that soon he will be in the top 10 or even higher,” the Russian said after the match, his words were quoted by Reuters.

Carlos Alcaraz / Photo: © Julian Finney / Staff / Getty Images Sport / Gettyimages.ru

Daniil at Wimbledon 2021 was considered as one of the main favorites, but he failed to justify this status. After defeating Alcaras, Medvedev put the squeeze on Croatian Marin Cilic in a tough five-set match, winning back from 0:2 in sets. But in the fourth round, Daniel was forced to cover his racket, losing in five sets to Hubert Hurkach from Poland. That tournament submitted to the phenomenal Novak Djokovic, who defeated the Italian Matteo Berrettini in the final.

After Wimbledon, Alcaraz and Medvedev met twice more, and both times the Spaniard won. Daniil’s predictions regarding Carlos came true – in two years the junior has grown to the title of the first racket of the world and the main hope of modern tennis. The next round of confrontation between top players will take place at the US Open, and there is no doubt that it will turn out to be very interesting.