Daniil Medvedev becomes first player to defeat Top Three ranked stars en route ATP Finals title, beating Dominic Thiem 4-6, 7-6, 6-4 in thrilling finale
Daniil Medvedev poses with the ATP Finals trophy at The O2 Arena, London. Pic/Getty Images
Daniil Medvedev did not travel an easy path to the biggest title of his career at the ATP Finals: He beat No. 3 Dominic Thiem for the championship after earlier getting past No. 1 Novak Djokovic and No. 2 Rafael Nadal.
By switching tactics and coming back for a 4-6, 7-6 (2), 6-4 victory over US Open champion Thiem in Sunday's final, No. 4 Medvedev became the first player to defeat each of the men ranked 1-3 in the season-ending championship—and only the fourth to do so at any tour event since 1990. "Means a lot," said Medvedev. "Shows what I'm capable of when I'm playing good, when I'm feeling good mentally, physically. So I know what I'm capable of. Just need to produce it more and more."
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The win against Thiem on an indoor hard court in an arena without spectators, who were barred because of the Coronavirus pandemic, followed those against Djokovic in the round-robin portion of the tournament and Nadal in Saturday's semi-finals Medvedev went 5-0 in all, quite a turnaround from a year ago, when he was 0-3 at the ATP Finals.
Medvedev closed 2020 by going 10-0 in November, including seven wins against members of the Top 10. He had zero victories over Top 10 opponents the preceding 12 months. He called this run "a great boost of confidence for all the Slams coming up and all the tournaments. Hopefully, I can continue this way."
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