Daniil Medvedev has reached the last eight of the China Open in just his second tournament with new coach Thomas Johansson in his corner.
Johansson is on a trial run with Medvedev, and so far he has guided the Russian to two quarterfinals, as well as a first top-50 win in three months, which he claimed against Cam Norrie.
The former world number one defeated Alejandro Davidovich Fokina in straight sets, 6-3, 6-3, to continue his campaign in Beijing.
After beating the Spaniard, Medvedev revealed what his game has been ‘lacking’ in recent times, which he is ‘trying to get back’.
Daniil Medvedev reacts to reaching the quarterfinals in Beijing
Analysing his performance in an on-court interview, he said: “It was not many winners, and a lot of unforced [errors] just because when it’s slow [the court], it’s tough to make on winners unless you hit like Carlos [Alcaraz] or Jannik [Sinner].
“I’m happy with the way I managed, first of all, of course, to put a lot of pressure on his serve because I probably won more games on his serve than he did on his serve, so that’s a great start.
“On my serve, I feel like I have not done too bad. There will have been maybe one game where I could have done better, but in general, I’m happy with the way I managed to win the match.”
Medvedev made the final of the China Open two years ago, and was asked what is different between his game now compared to then.
- 2023: Medvedev reaches the final of the China Open, loses to Jannik Sinner
- 2024: Medvedev reaches the semifinals of the China Open, loses to Carlos Alcaraz
He responded: “Maybe the serve was a bit better, but definitely the movement, not the movement itself was better, but just the feeling of the game, the general awareness which I was lacking a little bit lately, which I’m trying to get back.
“That’s also part of why I’m happy today is to win as many return games, you need to react fast on the return, you need to run faster on the next shot.
“Usually there’s a lot of dropshot against me, he did a few, I managed to catch them, so he stopped doing them, so yeah, everything needs to be better, a little bit, but it’s not too bad.”
Daniil Medvedev’s results during the Asian swing so far
Medvedev won his first match of the Asian swing against Nishesh Basavareddy at the Hangzhou Open, besting the American in straight sets to clinch his first ATP win under the wing of Johansson.
His Hangzhou campaign came to an end, however, when suffering defeat to Wu Yibing in the quarterfinals.
The China Open has been promising for Medvedev so far, having beaten former Wimbledon semifinalist Norrie before knocking out world number 20 Davidovich Fokina.
He is beginning to pick up some momentum in his pursuit of returning to the top of men’s tennis.
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