Third seed Daniil Medvedev of Russia beat his compatriot Karen Khachanov 6-3 6-3 in the quarterfinals of the Adelaide International on Friday. Medvedev did not have to toil much, as the match was over within one hour and 17 minutes.
The 26-year-old Russian will now face top seed Novak Djokovic of Serbia in the second semifinal on Saturday. Medvedev has not won a title quite some time now and should be eager to end his trophy drought in Adelaide.
Let’s take a look at how the match went on:
How Daniil Medvedev beat Karen Khachanov in Adelaide
# The match involved a lot of prolonged baseline exchanges:
Right from the beginning, the match involved a lot of lengthy baseline exchanges between the two players. Mostly, they were involved in crosscourt exchanges off either wing.
Still, Medvedev pulled the trigger when it mattered most, like on the break point in the seventh game of the first set, when Khachanov could not return the former’s down-the-line backhand.
The momentum thus swung firmly in favor of Medvedev, as he won the next two games as well. Khachanov’s tendency to commit unforced errors also did not help his cause.
# Khachanov was error-prone in the second set, as Medvedev held firm:
Khachanov struggled in the longer rallies in the second set as well. On a few other occasions, he wasted fine opportunities to win points and thus made Medvedev’s job easier.
Khachanov’s inability to consistently keep the ball inside the opponent’s court in the longer rallies once again led to his undoing. The 26-year-old Russian played a couple of his forehands wide and then hit what seemed to be a straightforward volley into the net to waste an advantageous position in the eighth game of the second set and thus allowed Medvedev to break him.
Medvedev then served out the match easily. His next showdown with Djokovic promises to be a mouth-watering clash that we should be looking forward to watching.
Main Photo from Getty.
