Semifinal titles: Alexandrova and Medvedev did not reach the titles

Last week Russian tennis representatives failed to take titles at the tournaments in Doha and Marseille. The closest to the coveted goal at the super tournament in Qatar were Ekaterina Alexandrova, who had one of the best stretches in her career, Mirra Andreeva and Diana Schneider (in doubles), and in France Daniil Medvedev reached the 1/2 final. However, he was stopped there by the rising star of world tennis Hamad Medjedovic from Serbia. Read more about the performance of our top players in the Izvestia article.

Two victories over the top-5

Ekaterina Alexandrova had another brilliant week after winning the WTA-500 tournament in Linz, Austria. In her first two meetings in Doha, the Russian defeated two Grand Slam champions: in the 1/32 finals, she defeated Emma Raducanu of Great Britain without dropping a set (6:3, 7:5) and then scored a strong willed victory (3:6, 6:3, 7:6) over Aryna Sobolenko.

After getting past the world number one from Belarus, Ekaterina reached the 1/8 finals against Elise Mertens, who she beat in two games (6:4, 6:2) and then eliminated the fifth seed Jessica Pegula from the USA (4:6, 6:1, 6:1). Ekaterina knocked out two top-5 opponents at the same tournament for the second time in her career. Earlier she managed to do it in Miami in 2024 (then passed Iga Sventek and the same Pegula).

Another representative of the USA Amanda Anisimova was waiting for Alexandrova in the 1/2 finals. Before the start of the meeting bookmakers preferred the Russian, considering her the favorite. But everything ended with a sensational result.

The match started very badly for Ekaterina. She immediately gave away her serve, and then lost three more games in a row. Of course, with the score 0:4, it was hard to expect a win in this set. Alexandrova put up a fight and even made a break, but these efforts were not enough: Anisimova was more active on court, made fewer errors and won a well-deserved victory.

In the second game, the Russian never recovered. It started 1:1, but then Ekaterina lost an important game on Amanda's serve: first she lost the lead at 40:15, and then she failed to realize two more break points. That was the turning point in the match. Anisimova left practically no chance and brought the match to a well-deserved final victory - 6:3, 6:3.

It should be noted that Anisimova eventually won the trophy in Qatar, defeating Jelena Ostapenko from Latvia in the final. Thanks to this success, Amanda added 23 positions in the ranking and is now on the 18th place. Alexandrova moved up four places and is now ranked 22nd in the WTA rankings.

Embarrassing defeat

The duo of Mirra and Diana is young in every sense. They started playing together only last August at the Paris Olympics. But in these five tournaments together, this is the third time they have faced Errani and Paolini. The confrontation began in the final of the Summer Games, where the Italians were stronger in the deciding tie-break - 2:6, 6:1, 10:7. However, the Russians took revenge in the second round of the Australian Open - 7:5, 7:5.

In Doha, Andreeva and Schneider started with a hard-fought victory over Americans Alicia Kruger and Jessica Pegula, and then went on to face the duos that last year claimed the title of the WTA's top pair. First, the top-seeded Canadian Gabriela Dabrowski and Erin Routliffe were beaten super-confidently. Then it seemed that our team had to take the title in Qatar after such a win. In the quarterfinals Mirra and Diana calmly took the upper hand over Irina Khromacheva from Moscow and Anna Danilina, who represents Kazakhstan. And here is the meeting with the Italians. It was Jasmine and Sarah who took the best pair award in 2024, leaving behind the Canadians, Khromacheva and Danilina, and three other duos.

The singles tournament in Qatar ended quite early for all four participants in the semifinal match. Schneider stopped in the first round, Andreeva - in the second, Paolini - in the third, and Errani did not get to the main draw at all, losing in qualifying to Veronika Kudermetova. So all four players were determined to realize their ambitions in the doubles tournament.

It was difficult to single out a clear favorite. Perhaps, a little more chances were given to the Russians. The girls are improving with each tournament, knocked out the main favorites in Doha, and the last head-to-head meeting with Sarah and Jasmine ended in their favor. And the first set remained for our girls. Paolini was the weak link of the opponents, but Errani did not let the team fall apart. Sarah has a long career and experience. In doubles tennis, she still plays admirably. And 37 is the same number of full years as Mirra and Diana!

Errani began to win back the advantage at the net. Her game helped the Italians to win a break back in the very end of the first game. Only in the next game Paolini made a mistake and our girls still won the set.

The second set started with a break by the Italians. But it didn't upset the Russians. At the end of the game they led with a break and Diana went to serve for the match. Suddenly our girls began to make mistakes uncharacteristic for both of them in this match: Mirra's serve collapsed and a double fault came, and Diana began to fail in interceptions. The Russians heroically pressed their opponents to the score 40:40 and got the first match point, but at the crucial moment Schneider failed to put her racket down.

Errani was still the driving force for the Italians, who intimidated Andreeva with her play at the net. Several times during the match Sara hit shots into Mirra's body. Of course, after all these cases she apologized, but the Russian clearly still had a psychological residue. Several times Andreeva did not dare to intercept when she needed to, and when she did engage in a shootout at the net, she was not very persistent and reliable.

Our girls lost the tie-break of the second set cleanly, although they fought back at the end. Perhaps, it helped to gather for the most intense part of the match. The tennis players exchanged mini-breaks, and with the score 7:6 in favor of the Italians, the Russians seemed to finally turn things in their favor. Schneider's serve and backhand play came in, forcing her opponents to make mistakes. Thus, Mirra and Diana earned a double match point (9:7). Only Paolini and Errani didn't waver. Jasmine started the backhand with a brilliant forehand, and then Sara again showed herself a real queen at the net. The Italians made amends for their defeat in Melbourne and took the lead again against Andreeva and Schneider.

Beat Djokovic

Daniil Medvedev made a strong start to the tournament in Marseille, beating Pierre-Hugues Herbert (6-2, 6-4) and Jan-Lennard Struff (6-3, 6-2). The Russian looked great in both matches and seemed to be a serious favorite in the match against world No. 96 Hamad Medjedovic. In addition, Medvedev had a head-to-head advantage before the semifinals. Daniil and Hamad have met only once before: in May 2024, the Russian had no trouble defeating the Serbian in the third round of the Rome tournament (7:6, 2:6, 7:5).

It was not possible to repeat that success. The game started with a break for Medvedev, but the advantage could not be developed - in the next game the Serbian took the other's serve. The two players continued to be on a level playing field: Hamad occasionally impressed with his powerful serve (he won four aces in the first set), while Daniil felt more comfortable in long games. However, in one of them Medjedovic made the Russian fall - Daniel reached for the ball and found himself on the court.

At 3:3, the match scenario changed slightly: the Serbian took his serve, as usual, and then made his second break - at 5:3, he went out to serve with a great chance to take the first set. In the deciding game, Medvedev's nerves frayed: when Hamad made the score 30-0, the Russian threw his racket onto the court - he even had to replace it. And Medjedovic got three set points and realized the first one.

Medvedev was unhappy with his game and at the end of the set was constantly cursing at his team. The main statistical disaster for the Russian is the percentage of balls won on second serves. In the first set Daniil never scored points after them and slightly conceded the percentage after the first serve - 69 vs. 73.

The beginning of the second game repeated the start of the first - the rivals again exchanged breaks: for a while it seemed that each played more comfortably on serve. Medjedovic again took a game on Daniil's serve, and then started his own game with a lost point at 2:1. However, Medvedev did not develop the advantage.

In the second set, Daniil served no better than in the first: he finally started to take points after the second ball (40%), but he almost stopped giving his opponent problems with the first ball - he won only 46% of his games, compared to 83% for the Serb. A catastrophic gap. Not surprisingly, Hamad increased his lead to 4:1 with three break points.

By this point, it was as if the Russian had resigned himself to defeat - he stopped showing emotion and often only addressed coach Gilles Servard, as well as occasionally showing a thumbs-up. It's unclear whether it was an ironic appeal to the staff or an assessment of the young opponent's play. Medjedovic did not get distracted by Medvedev's problems and continued to move closer to victory and the second final of his adult career. Before the end of the match Daniil took only one more game and lost 2:6 - Hamad sealed the matchball with an ace.

In Marseille, Daniel earned 100 points and rose from seventh to sixth place, surpassing Novak Djokovic. Now the entire elite of men's tennis will meet in Doha. Medvedev will play his compatriot Karen Khachanov in the first round.