Russian No. 2 seed Daniil Medvedev opened the Nitto ATP Finals with a three-set victory over No. 7 seed Hubert Hurkacz of Poland on Sunday in Turin, Italy.
Medvedev won 6-7 (5), 6-3, 6-4 to win his first match of round-robin action. He smashed 15 aces to Hurkacz’s 12, and the Pole never pushed him to break point.
“I had zero break points to save, so in a way I was never under pressure,” Medvedev said in his on-court interview. “I had only two games on Hubert’s serve where I had break points. Super happy to make this work and (that I) managed to get both breaks.”
Medvedev fell behind 6-2 in the first-set tiebreak but clawed his way back to 6-5. Hurkacz finally put him away on his fourth set point.
Early in the third set, Medvedev won a hard-fought point on a 29-shot rally.
“I remember this point because that’s the only point in the match where I could actually interact with the crowd a little bit,” Medvedev said. “Other than that, it was aces, winners and unforced errors.”
Also Sunday, No. 3 seed Alexander Zverev of Germany won his first match of the finals when Italian No. 6 Matteo Berrettini retired down 7-6 (7), 1-0.
Berrettini retired due to a left oblique injury. According to the ATP, it is the first time a singles player retired in the ATP Finals since Andre Agassi in 1998.
“I don’t really know what to say, because this is the worst feeling a player can have,” Zverev said in his on-court interview. “You play all year long to qualify for this beautiful tournament. For Matteo playing at home, this is the worst feeling I think he will ever have in his career.”
The ATP Finals are the tour’s season-ending championships and pit the top eight singles players and doubles teams according to the ATP rankings. In singles, players begin with a single round-robin in two groups of four. The top two players in each group advance to the knockout phase.
Medvedev and Zverev are in the red group and are now 1-0. The green group will begin play Monday when top seed Novak Djokovic of Serbia faces Norwegian eighth seed Casper Ruud and No. 4 seed Stefanos Tsitsipas of Greece takes on No. 5 seed Andrey Rublev of Russia.
–Field Level Media
