Alex de Minaur, one of the finest tennis players, finally revealed a reason as to why he lost his bout against Russian opponent Daniil Medvedev.
The Australian spoke up on his loss in the fourth round of the US Open and highlighted the key factors that rendered him incapable of moving into the next round. In a rather interesting take on the loss, Alex revealed that his loss had ‘nothing to do with tennis’, instead, it was the lack of conditioning and recovery that had cost him the ticket to the quarter-final of the competition.
Although Alex started the match on a high note, setting the tempo for the game by winning the first set, it was Daniil who orchestrated the later ones. The Russian sealed the win over him in four, scoring a 2-6 6-4 6-1 6-2 win.
Post the disappointing result, de Minaur was asked by the journalists in the post-match presser the reason he could not keep up his intensity throughout the match and what went wrong for him. To which, the Australian said that it was his fitness that held him back from scoring a win.
The World No. 13 had been through a busy schedule coming into the last Grand Slam of the year with appearances in the Cincinnati Open, Mexican Open, and Canadian Open just a few weeks back. De Minaur said that it was the reason he wasn’t able to sustain his performances.
“Ultimately, what happened out there was nothing to do with tennis,” said Alex.
“It was a little bit to do with just physicality. I had a lot of matches this whole summer without a lot of time off and rest, and it seemed to have caught up with me at this moment,” de Minaur added.
“It’s probably the first time in my career that fitness let me down. It’s not something that happens. I back myself every day of the year. But with all the matches that I played, my schedule, everything, I got to this point, and the small margins, small percentages, are pretty big at this stage and level of competition.”
“The conditions were some of the most brutal we’ve ever played,” Daniil Medvedev comments on the weather at the US Open
Russian tennis phenomenon Daniil Medvedev was able to overcome the Australian challenger in De Minaur to book his berth in the quarter-final of the competition. But it wasn’t just a human opponent he one-upped.
Medvedev pointed out the harsh conditions in which he had to compete. He said that it was one of the most ‘brutal’ matches he had ever played.
“The conditions were some of the most brutal we’ve ever played.”
The Russian star said that he had almost decided to give up but managed to pull one through due to his opponent, Alex also suffering from it.
“There was one moment where I thought I’m not going to be able to play until the end, it’s so tough. But I looked across the net and noticed he was slowing down too, so I thought okay, I can do this. Then I managed to serve much better, and it changed the match,” Daniil said in his on-court interview.
