Daniil Medvedev offers ‘crazy’ excuse after foul-mouthed rant at umpire in Monte Carlo
Daniil Medvedev admitted he ‘went crazy’ on court during an expletive-laced verbal attack on umpire Mohamed Leyhani and a line judge at the Monte Carlo Masters.
In scenes reminiscent of Andrey Rublev’s disqualification for an angry outburst against an official that got him thrown out of a tournament in Dubai earlier this year, Medvedev screamed at the chair umpire and a line judge after two close calls in quick succession went against him.
Umpire Leyhani did his best to calm down Medvedev and even pleaded with him not to scream at the line judge, with the Russian star calming his anger to seal a 6-2, 6-4 win against Frenchman Gael Monfils.
Television commentators around the world were forced to apologise for Medvedev’s language that was picked up by on-court microphones and he admitted after the match that he had lost his cool on court.
“I go crazy. I lose two games because I go crazy. I calm down. I win the match, so I’m happy. That’s my part of the story, I guess,” said Medvedev, smiling at reporters as he made his excuses.
“I mean, first of all, knowing who I am and where I come from in terms of my attitude, I’m going to get crazy sometimes on court. Whether it’s myself, my team, crowd, umpire, I’m going to go crazy sometimes. I’m trying to work that I go crazy less and it affects my game less.
“Now I am happy because in another match I could lose because of this, but in this match, I managed to be more calm and I had Love-30, and he hit, like, a let and he won the game and I get crazy again.
“Actually, I managed to calm myself down again, saying to myself I don’t want to lose the match because of what happened now because of me getting crazy. I want to continue playing the way I should play. I want to continue to try to win, and I managed to do it.
READ MORE: Tennis great criticises Daniil Medvedev for ‘lack of self-control’ after Monte Carlo outburst
“Sometimes if you don’t control the crazy in the moment you have to control the crazy after the moment, and I didn’t control it best.
” I managed to do it much better than sometimes before in my career. That’s why I managed to win the match.”
Medvedev even admitted he wasn’t entirely sure that the baseline calls he has lost his temper about was out, even though ATP Hawkeye technology suggested they were.
https://twitter.com/TennisChannel/status/1778060633222549977
“I cannot actually say 100% it was out, because I still didn’t see it myself,” he added.
“From what I heard from someone, I think like from ATP, that it was out. When I saw it, I saw it out like this, like quite big, and I didn’t even stay there to check what Mohamed says.
“When he comes in and I see his edit, I’m like, he’s literally going to say it’s in when it’s out. I told him, Okay, what do we do if it’s in? Because I know it’s out. What do we do after the match if I lose this game, which I lost, because it would be 40-Love and not 30-15.
“Then I was, like, Okay, calm down, Daniil. Let’s go for next point, let’s go for next games.
“What happens next if the ball is even more out and the line umpire doesn’t say anything? The ball is very slow. He’s right there. I have no idea how it’s possible that he doesn’t say out.”
Medvedev may have umpire Leyhani to thank for remaining in the tournament as the anger he was displaying towards the line judge could have led to points penalties or worse.
Yet this ended up being a footnote on another explosive Medvedev performance, as the player who always insisted he loathes playing on clay courts continues to make big strides forward on his least favourite surface.
