Medvedev's desperate attempt to save his Roland Garros run

Roland Garros

Medvedev's desperate attempt to save his Roland Garros run

11th seed changed strings during five-set first-round loss on Tuesday

Peter Staples Daniil Medvedev is now 18-11 on the season. By ATP Staff

Daniil Medvedev pulled out all the stops, even a mid-match switch of strings, but not even drastic measures could save him from an early exit at Roland Garros.

The 11th seed fell to a first-round defeat to Cameron Norrie on Tuesday, failing to serve out the match at 5-4 in the fifth set. Medvedev later revealed that he changed his string setup during the match, a tactic he once avoided but has now adopted.

“Until 2023, I [had] never done it,” said Medvedev when asked of the change. “Something started to change on Tour, I had to adapt. Now I'm never sure. I played Karen [Khachanov in Doha]. During the match, I see that I'm not going to win. So I changed my strings to completely different strings and I win the match…

“Every tournament is so different. This one is so different from Rome and Madrid. [The] clay, the balls, everything. I had one week here. I didn't find anything that worked well. So during the match, I had to change something when I was losing. It actually worked. Unfortunately I didn't win.”

The drastic change seemed to have paid off after Medvedev had rallied from two sets down to give himself the opportunity to serve for the match. Yet the former No. 1 player in the PIF ATP Rankings stumbled in an error-strewn finish, falling to his sixth first-round defeat at Roland Garros.

“It was kind of more loose before and the ones that I took after were less loose,” Medvedev explained. “I could hit a bit more and maybe miss less. When I tried them on practice, people were killing me. So maybe in the match it's a bit different, everyone is a bit tight so going through the court less. I changed for something that I would make less mistakes [with].”

Medvedev’s first Lexus ATP Head2Head defeat to Norrie in five matches drew similarities with his loss to #NextGenATP Learner Tien in the second round at the Australian Open, where he rallied from two sets down before falling in the decider. When asked to compare, Medvedev was quick to point out that bitter defeats are part of the game.

“The career is long, so [with] some matches I won like this, I would [also] not think too much about it,” said Medvedev, who rallied from two sets down to beat Emil Ruusuvuori in five sets in Melbourne in 2024. “But it's [an] unfortunate situation in both matches. Look at the Australian Open in 2024, which was a year and a half ago, which is not long ago, I managed to do it the other way around. It's just tennis.

“This year I lost maybe three matches where I could serve it out. I need to do better next time. Next time I'm there, maybe I [will] do the same thing. Today, unfortunately, [there is] nothing I can do and [I have to] get ready for the next one.”

After his three-hour, 52-minute defeat, Medvedev owns an 18-11 record on the season, according to the Infosys ATP Win/Loss Index. He has also slipped to 18th in the PIF ATP Live Race To Turin and faces a tall order to qualify for the Nitto ATP Finals in November.

Medvedev triumphed at the season finale in 2020, and has made six consecutive appearances at the event. However, the 29-year-old is yet to reach a tour-level final since the 2024 ATP Masters 1000 in Indian Wells and has not lifted a title since Rome in 2023.

Despite his disappointing early exit in Paris, Medvedev has been on the ATP Tour long enough to know that heartbreak and redemption often go hand in hand.

“I probably think it's the same,” Medvedev said when asked about his method of processing defeats. “I lost probably three times here in the first round in five sets. It's always the same story. Maybe one week, two weeks before the next tournament, I'm going to be feeling not good, I'm going to change the surface, so in your game you're not going to feel not good, maybe next tournament is not going to be easy.

“Then you wait, work hard, and wait for the moment where it goes up again. [I’m] disappointed to lose, but I have 10 more tournaments this year or maybe 12, I need to try to play them well.”

Click here to read article