Second seed Daniil Medvedev of Russia beat Andrea Vavassori of Italy 6-4 6-3 to book a place in the third round of the Madrid Open on Saturday. He will face his compatriot Alexander Shevchenko in the third round on Sunday.
The match got over within two hours as Vavassori failed to repeat his giant-killing act of beating Andy Murray that he did on Thursday. We will now take a look at how the match progressed:
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Vavassori’s limited approach did not help his cause:
Knowing very well that he would not be able to contend with Daniil Medvedev from the baseline because of his weaker backhand, Vavassori attempted serve-and-volley too often in the match. He struggled to hit his backhand well enough whenever he had the chance to do so and the 27-year-old Russian capitalized on that.
Vavassori won a few points with his volleys by rushing the net, but also had to be on the receiving end of Medvedev’s passes on a number of occasions. Moreover, his approach became more predictable and one-dimensional as the match went on. The Russian broke Vavassori once in the first set, which was enough for him to win it.
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Daniil Medvedev moved really well:
Daniil Medvedev yet again exhibited his outstanding movement on the court. He repeatedly chased down Vavassori’s drop volleys and drop volleys with his rapid runs to prevent the Italian from gaining an upper hand in the match.
Medvedev also repeatedly put pressure on Vavassori’s second serve. The Italian could win only 29% of the points on his second delivery, while Medvedev managed a far better 82%. The Russian once again got the decisive break of serve in the second set and then went on to serve the match out.
Main Photo Credit: Susan Mullane-USA TODAY Sports
