Early departure: why Medvedev and Rublev cannot find stability

The news of his return to the top of the national ranking did not help Andrei Rublev get out of a series of failures. In the opening match at the Miami Masters, the 27-year-old Muscovite lost to Belgian Ziz Bergs, the 51st racket of the world. This is the third consecutive defeat of our tennis player after the epic triumph at the Pentathlete in Doha. Due to the peculiarities of 12-month scoring, Andrey, at the height of his black streak, will still become the best player among Russians, ahead of Daniil Medvedev for the first time in two years. However, presumably, this is unlikely to please Rublev much. About why the affairs of our tennis stars are developing with varying success this season, see the Izvestia article.

The black stripe

The Miami Masters is striking with the abnormal results of the favorites. In the very first matches, all four semi-finalists of Indian Wells, the previous super tournament, which was also rich in sensations, were eliminated. Jack Draper, Carlos Alcaraz, Daniil Medvedev and Holger Rune did not stay long in Florida. By the way, the failure of the latter allowed Medvedev to retain his place in the top 10. Rublev flew to Miami in the first round a year ago, so point protection was not relevant for him now, and he remains on the ninth line, one step above Daniil. This has not happened since the beginning of 2023, when Medvedev briefly dropped out of the elite ten. However, Andrei is not in the mood for pleasant memories or statistical and historical calculations right now.

The time of the first: how far will Andreeva and Medvedev be able to walk in Indian Wells

In the second week of the tournament, our stars will face difficult opponents.

Rublev went into the match against Bergs with a week's worth of stubble, and in the first set he acted very collected — he didn't freak out, and during the transitions he peacefully ate a banana. Until the 12th game, the game developed without incident, until at the crucial moment, Andrei, with the score 5:6, made a double mistake on the opponent's break ball. After that, the upset Russian complained to the referee about the fans who were shouting during the draw, and went for a toilet break. Rublev returned from the podium charged for the fight and immediately took the opponent's serve. With the score 4-2 in favor of Andrey in the middle of the second set, it seemed that nothing would stop our tennis player from restoring parity, but then the Russian's game broke completely. He lost four games in a row and ended his performance in the USA.

Our Olympic champion is approaching the start of the clay season with three hard-court defeats in a row. When Andrey won the Doha tournament in February and impressed everyone with his ability to control emotions, it seemed that the main misfortunes of the charming star were over. Earlier, the tennis player had greatly frightened the public with suicidal posts on social networks and stories in interviews about the loss of life motivation amid failures on the court. Many advised Rublev to take a break from his career, but he decided to solve psychological problems without interrupting performances. And not only did he not take a vacation, but he increased the intensity of his matches, appearing not only in doubles, but also in mixed doubles. And he really succeeded in self-control.

In recent months, Andrey has hardly lost his temper in public — he does not engage in self-harm, does not send judges and generally behaves very sportily. Although it is clear that it is not easy for him. Perhaps it is the negative energy that the star Russian is now driving inside that prevents him from showing his true capabilities on the court. Rublev is used to gushing with emotions during matches, but now he looks more like his own shadow. This strategy produced results in Doha. But then there were failures in the very first matches in Dubai, Indian Wells and Miami. And this is a new wake-up call. So the idea of taking a break from the tournament race is not so bad.

Back injury

When one of the best tennis players in the world, the winner and multiple finalist of Grand Slam tournaments loses in two sets in the first round to the 56th racket, it is impossible to guess what his reaction will be, whether he will come out to the media at all. Moreover, a racket was thrown during the game, and Daniil Medvedev's mood after 2:6, 3:6 from Spaniard Jaume Munyar did not even have to guess. In the second set, at 3:5, there was hope — 15:40 on Munyar's serve. But he hit the first two serves, and at "even" the long draw ended with an unsuccessful shortened shot by the Russian...

It turned out to be an injury. After the tournament in Indian Wells, Medvedev had severe back pain, the pain passed every day and allowed him to go to the game. But, alas, she did not allow herself to be forgotten. At the same time, the tennis player paid tribute to his opponent — he said that his own physical condition was superimposed on Munyar's good game. Anyway, it became clear why after his performance in Indian Wells, where Daniil reached the semifinals and showed a storm of emotions after a winning shot in the tiebreak of the quarterfinals with Arthur Fis, he did not look like himself in Florida.

— Could the crisis in my game be related to the unsuccessful experience of working with coach Gilles Simon, with whom we recently broke up? I don't think it's about working with Simon, by any means," Daniil Medvedev told Izvestia. — On the contrary, it seems to me that, in principle, a good job was done, but in the end we decided to part ways. As for the crisis, it manifests itself in different ways. I was unlucky in some tournaments, and I played against strong opponents somewhere. There were tournaments like Wimbledon and the US Open, where I played well, but lost to Alcaraz and Sinner — this can happen. And there were competitions where I lost to worse tennis players, and this happened for various reasons. In some places, people played well, and in others, I played poorly. Now "physics" has failed. The reasons are different, you shouldn't look too much into the past, you need to live in the present and the future. I will try to play better and harder. And win.

Bad reception: how Medvedev and Rublev started in Dubai

Daniel comes to his senses after poisoning, Andrey goes to prepare for a major tournament in Indian Wells.

Medvedev also shared his plans.

— Did Karen Khachanov say that I will be able to return to the first place in the world ranking? Thanks a lot to Karen! Daniel continued. — At the moment, the task of becoming the first racket of the world is not worth it. Now the task is to continue to look for my level, which I found better and better with each tournament (a reference to Indian Wells, where he reached the semifinals - Izvestia). Unfortunately, in Miami, I couldn't move around the court properly at all. Therefore, I am focused only on continuing to work and show my best tennis. At such moments, I can win important matches against big players. And only then, if and when I win some tournaments, I can think about something more. But so far, of course, this is out of the question.

Of the Russians, only Roman Safiullin made it to the third round of the Masters in Miami. The native of Podolsk passed American Jenson Brooksby and Australian Alexei Popyrin. Next, he will have a match with Jakub Menshik from the Czech Republic.