• Home
  • Tennis
  • Daniil Medvedev relishing showdown against home favourite Nick Kyrgios

Daniil Medvedev relishing showdown against home favourite Nick Kyrgios

US Open champion Medvedev as the highest seed in the field following the deportation of Novak Djokovic.

Daniil Medvedev understands the task at hand ahead of his second round clash against Nick Kyrgios at the Australian Open.
Novak Djokovic's deportation leaves US Open champion Medvedev as the highest seed in the field and is on paper, the favourite to claim a second successive grand slam crown.
He eased past Switzerland's Henri Laaksonen 6-1 6-4 7-6 (3), but it will be a very different experience on Thursday against the talented and mercurial Kyrgios, who was a doubt for the tournament after testing positive for Covid-19 but put on his usual show against Liam Broady.
Kyrgios has won their only two previous meetings, and Medvedev said: "It's definitely going to be not easy against the crowd. He's going to try to pump himself up, he likes to play big names.
"But I will do my preparation, I will try to play good. If I'm going to be playing good it's not going to be easy for him and probably we're going to have a good match."
Kyrgios played down his chances, saying of his opponent: "He's probably the best player in the world at the moment. So I'm pretty excited, I'm excited for that moment. That's why I play the game.
"I feel like those matches still excite me, to go out there and play the best in the world. That was always something I wanted to prove to people that someone like me could do. I'm not going to go into it with a lot of expectation. I'm going to go out there, have some fun, play my game."

Stefanos Tsitsipas progresses

Stefanos Tsitsipas representing Greece at the ATP Cup, 2022
Fourth seed Stefanos Tsitsipas headlined the night session on Rod Laver Arena and was untroubled in a 6-2 6-4 6-3 victory over Swede Mikael Ymer.
Fifth seed Andrey Rublev was another comfortable winner, beating Gianluca Mager 6-3 6-2 6-2, but ninth seed Felix Auger-Aliassime had to recover from being bagelled by Emil Ruusuvuori before coming through 6-4 0-6 3-6 6-3 6-4.
Maxime Cressy won an all-American battle against John Isner, upsetting the 22nd seed in five sets, while 11th seed Jannik Sinner was a straight-sets winner over Joao Sousa.

Read more: Emma Raducanu defeats former US Open champion Sloane Stephens at the Australian Open

More Articles