Daniil Medvedev’s fury at the Masters 1000 in Monte Carlo: anger with the referee and racket in the air

Daniel Medvedev had a fleeting pass Monte Carlo Masters 1000. He batted on debut Gaël Monfilsafter being released in the first round as the fourth seed, but failed to make it past the round of 16, in which she lost 6-3 and 7-5 to Karen Khachanov. A victory and a defeat in a tournament in which the Russian once again did his duty. In the duel against his compatriot, a controversial ruling made him angry, he threw a racket and ended up arguing with the referee and the ATP supervisor. And, obviously, booed by the audience.

The former number one’s explosion began when Khachanov broke his serve in the final part of the second set, leaving him ahead 6-3 and 6-5, with the possibility of serving for the match. Medvedev, stunned, threw the racket as if it were a frisbee against the canvas at the back of the court and walked to his chair.

Upon arrival, he noticed that the doctors were approaching him and began shouting at them. Carlos Bernardesthe match referee. “I asked for physical therapy!? I asked for physical therapy!?”he exclaimed.

The Brazilian judge, one of the most respected on the circuit and who will retire at the end of this season, responded calmly: “I asked them to come because of the bleeding”he told him, pointing to the cut on Medvedev’s hand.

“Carlos, did I ask for the physiotherapist?!!!”, the Russian complained again. And then he had a heated argument with Cedric Mourierthe ATP supervisor, who approached just as the medics were leaving the field.

“Cedric, go and look at the marking. The marking is out. They don’t know how to referee anymore. The sign is out! Who will take action?! Yesterday the ball was bad and they called it good. Who will act? This ball is out too.”he exclaimed, clearly angry at some recent failure.

“Who will be responsible for the mistake?! It is not my responsibility to referee matches. He’s this guy with glasses. You don’t need glasses, because you can’t see anything. I shouldn’t be a judge. It’s right in front of him. It’s a slow ball, 15-30 and 5-5. He is a bad judge. He should be out of the loop. It’s brick dust, it’s not a concrete field. It’s out,” he continued, referring to a ball from Khachanov that, in his opinion, had been bad, but which was validated by the judges to give the match winner two break opportunities.

Mourier tried to calm him down, but his attempts were unsuccessful.

“Answer me. The camera is watching. Who will take responsibility. You are the supervisor. Who will take responsibility after the match? Since the ball was bad, you can check it. I just lost a game because of this. It was 3-30pm, it became 3-40pm. Carlos called the physiotherapist when I didn’t ask him. When I didn’t need it. And he (pointing to the linesman) doesn’t see the ball out.”Medvedev continued.

And when the supervisor had already left, he closed: “They are circumventing the norm. Open your damn eyes. Open the. Sit there and do something. Open your eyes now. It’s bad”.

Bernardes then announced that Medvedev had been penalized one point for his actions, so Khachanov started the next match with a 15-0 lead and only needed to win three more points to seal the victory.

In the midst of his angry protest, Medvedev recalled a similar situation experienced the day before, in the match against Monfils, when Mohamed Lahyanithe referee of that match, changed the decision of a line judge and called a ball from the Frenchman which had been bad.

“He was out, he was out”said the Russian at half-time. “I saw it inside. Maybe I was wrong. If I was wrong, I’ll apologize.”replied the Swedish judge, while Daniil vented his anger by leaning on his chair.

“How are you going to apologize?! I lost the damn game! This is a cursed sport. I don’t know how… Oh my God! It’s ridiculous, they don’t see anything.”He continued.

After sealing the victory, now calmer, the Russian continued the controversy and wrote about the objective of the official broadcast: “In or out?”

Before the start of the tournament, in an interview with his country’s M-Sport media, Medvedev assured: “I am a completely different person, on and off the pitch. Since I don’t have a competitive aspect in my personal life, I live more calmly and focus on myself. On the pitch, this focus goes much further. Maybe my problem is that there I can’t focus only on myself. And because of this I become a completely different person“.

The period spent in Monte Carlo demonstrated that this reading is not wrong. And while when he isn’t playing you can see him relaxed and smiling; That explosive Daniil appeared on the pitch again, and he can’t control his anger.

Tsitsipas’ long victory

Stefanos Tsitsipas He suffered a lot to reach the quarter-finals of Monte Carlo. The Greek survived the German’s unexpected comeback Alexander Zverevwho overcame a 0-5 and match point deficit in the second set, and won 7-5 and 7-6 (7-3) in just over two hours of play.

Tsitsipas, the twelfth seed, had the match under control and seemed to be able to close the match without problems. However, fifth seed Zverev did not give up. In the sixth game, He prevented the Greek from breaking serve and closing the second set to zero.; He then won five consecutive games (including two breaks) and ended up forcing the tie. And only in the tie-break was Stefanos able to play again like at the beginning and take the victory.

“It was the adventure of my life”, Tsitsipas joked after the match. “It’s something I don’t deal with every day and the dynamic has changed dramatically in some places. It went one direction and then completely the opposite direction. I don’t know, I’m trying to find out what happened. In the second set it was 5-0, but things went quite well in the tie break, especially when I got the mini-break.”

His next rival will be Khachanov, Medvedev’s executioner.

In the other round of 16 match of the day, the Norwegian Casper Ruudeighth seed, beat the Pole 6-4, 6-2 Hubert Hurkacztenth and French Ugo Umberto14th, beat the Italians 5-7, 6-3 and 6-1 Lorenzo Sonego, lucky loser. The two winners will meet in the quarter-finals.