Daniil Medvedev sets out to snap trend before the end of 2023
World No 3 Daniil Medvedev will have four chances to break a trend that he has found himself locked into before the end of the 2023 season.
Medvedev was made aware during his run in Beijing that he has won each of his titles in a different city.
The implication of that statistic is that Medvedev has never defended a title or returned to claimed a repeat title at an event he has already won.
Interestingly the four events he has on his schedule for the remainder of the season are all events he has previously won.
Medvedev arrives in Shanghai as the defending champion having won the event the last time it was held back in 2019.
He holds titles from the Paris indoors and Vienna as well and also won the Tour finals in 2020, albeit in a different city from the current host venue in Turin.
Having seen this stat brought to his attention in Beijing, Medvedev has now become determined to get the monkey off his back.
“I hope, because this year I play four more tournaments, and all of them I won, so I hope I can break this thing, win one of them. I would be very happy,” Medvedev said.
Medvedev has been in great touch on hard courts and wasn’t too discouraged to lose the Beijing final to Jannik Sinner across a pair of tiebreaks.
“I’m in good shape now,” Medvedev said.
“Even again today, the match was good, was good tennis. Had to do better if I wanted to win, but it was good tennis. I want to continue playing good this season. It’s not over. A lot of points to try to gain.
“Going to Shanghai to show my best and hopefully I can do it.”
Medvedev felt that the only way he could have performed better in the championship match against Sinner would have been to be sharper in the tiebreaks.
“Came down to the tiebreaks where he was much better than me,” Medvedev said.
“2 and 2, I should have done better. That’s unfortunately how tennis can be.
‘I hope that next time if I have to play two tiebreaks in the final I can win it. That’s the only way forward. I need to try to do better next time when I have a tiebreak in the final. Not much I can add to this.”
Medvedev opens his Shanghai Masters campaign on Saturday against Cristian Garin.
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