This Sunday saw two ATP 500 champions. While Medvedev won Ester Vienna Open, Felix conquered his third consecutive title in a month with a win in Basel.
Daniil Medvedev wins the second title of the year
Daniil Medvedev won his second title of the year defeating Denis Shapavalov 4-6,6-3,6-2.
The 26-year-old former world number one who has also become a father for the first time celebrated with a title in Vienna
Before the final, the Russian hadn’t dropped a set in the whole week. However, Shapavalov played some great tennis hitting 21 winners to take the lead of a set.
However, Medvedev counter-attacked with some great shots in reply winning the second set by 6-3 and making it even.
The third set was only one-sided and Medvedev broke Shapavalov’s serve multiple times. It seemed as if the Canadian had gassed out. Medvedev eventually won by converting his sixth match point with a scoreline of 4-6,6-3,6-2,
Medvedev, who had only reached the quarterfinals the last time he played in Vienna, said he was very happy with the result.
It was the best match of the week according to the former number 1. He said the Canadian star played unreal till 4-3 in the second set and after that, he dropped his level and he took advantage of that drop.
“This is one of the best victories when you know your opponent is on top of you, but you try and stay there and do what you can,” stated Medvedev,
This is Medvedev’s 15th title overall. He has two final events this year now.
The first one is the Paris Masters, where he lost to Serbian Novak Djokovic the previous year, It will start on Monday.
The last tournament of the season is ATP Finals in Turin. Medvedev has won it in 2020. He said he liked to play hardcourt indoors and he usually does well in those tournaments. Thus he was hopeful of doing well in both the remaining tournaments.
On the other side, Shapovalov has now lost the second final in October as he was bested by Japan’s Yoshihito Nishioka in Seoul. With this defeat, he is left with just one title which he won in Stockholm in 2019.
Felix wins Swiss Indoors: Clinches third title in a row
On Sunday, Canadian number 1, Felix Auger-Aliassime won his third title in as many weeks as he beat another youngster Holger Rune 6-3, 7-5 in the finals of the Swiss Indoor, Basel.
With this win, the 9th ranked Canadian has jumped to the number six in the ATP race to Turin, almost securing his place in ATP Finals starting from November 13.
Auger-Aliassime had previously won in Florence and Antwerp in as many weeks. With this, he had a streak of 13 wins in a row.
Rune, who had won his last nine including the Stockholm title was looking for his consecutive title. Rune saved two match points but in vain. He also got an unsportsmanlike conduct warning for shouting
Auger-Aliassime said that he was feeling “over the moon” after winning his fourth trophy of the season.
He said that it had been a great week for the Canadian as he didn’t get broken even once throughout the week not getting broken. “It’s been a dream for me.”, stated Aliassime further.
The Canadian hit 28 winners in a course of winning the title and as many unforced errors. The match didn’t even last for an hour.
Auger-Aliassime hit 11 aces and broke Rune once in each set.
The Canadian last faced a defeat on October 3rd in Astana by Roberto Bautista Agut.
Felix took an early lead of 3-1. He was 0-30 after that, however, he immediately overcame it to make it 4-1.
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He won the first set in 34 minutes and frustration was visible on Rune’s face/
Rune fought back in the second set and the third seed didn’t get any break till 5-5. Felix broke in Rune’s next serve despite him saving four break points. This angered Rune and he got warned for ball abuse.
A game later, it was all but over for Rune as Felix emerged victorious with 6-3, 7-5.
Holger Rune was also happy with his run in the tournament. He said he had played some good tennis in the last couple of weeks. He also appreciated Felix stating that his serve was “the best” he had played against. or the first time.
