Medvedev: Problem was execution, not tactics vs. Sinner

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After having success against Jannik Sinner with an aggressive game plan in the Australian Open final, Daniil Medvedev went back to the well on Friday at the Miami Open presented by Itau.

By attacking the Italian in Melbourne, Medvedev won the first two sets before falling just short of his second Grand Slam title. In the Miami semi-finals, the third seed never got out of second gear in a 6-1, 6-2 defeat.

"My plan was to play aggressive kind of like in Australia, a bit more aggressive than I usually do, and it's always a risk," Medvedev said in his post-match press conference. "Because even if I practise this on practice courts, my game is like counter, defensive style. But I felt like against him, and that's why I did it in Australia, this might not be not enough anymore, and that's why the head-to-head is a little bit worse than it was a couple of months ago."

After winning his first six Lexus ATP Head2Head meetings against Sinner, Medvedev has now lost their past five matches beginning with the 2023 Beijing final. Despite not being able to repeat the result from their 2023 Miami final, Medvedev was happy with his tactics on Friday's matchup of Top 5 stars in the PIF ATP Rankings.

"I think the tactics I used in the beginning of the match was not the problem. The problem was the execution, too many mistakes, not enough precision," he assessed.

"So for sure after a match like this, I'm asking myself if I should have changed it earlier, but I stuck to what I thought was going to work, and I wanted to do it better and I didn't manage to do it. When I changed, it was just too late... When I have the next match against him, I'm going to see what I do and how I develop."

In addition to his recent struggles against Sinner, Medvedev has not won a tour-level title since his surprise Rome run last May. On that front, the 28-year-old is keeping a positive perspective, acknowledging the caliber of tournaments in which he has been competing.

"I'm trying to play the best tournaments in the world. I think if we look tournament by tournament, I'm losing against big players," he said. "I have been in some finals and I lost against Sinner, Djokovic, Alcaraz — and for sure I want to beat them and, let's say, be better than them. But I didn't manage to do it and I have to work on it either mentally or tennis-wise.

"For example, on clay I'm going to play Monte-Carlo, Rome, Madrid and Roland Garros. It might be tough to get a title there, but if I would play 10 [ATP] 250s a year, I'd probably get some titles. Never be too confident, but I'm sure I would be able to. But I'm trying to play the best tournaments in the world."

Medvedev has reached two finals this year, at the Australian Open and Indian Wells. He also reached the semi-finals in both Miami and Dubai, where he lost to Ugo Humbert as the top seed at the ATP 500.

Sinner, by contrast, won the AO and Rotterdam titles this season before a semi-final defeat to Alcaraz in Indian Wells and his current Miami run. Asked what the Italian has improved since their meeting in last year's Miami final, Medvedev singled out one particular shot.

"He misses less, he chooses his shots more wisely," Medvedev said, before narrowing his answer. "He serves 10 times better. Jannik was always serving well, but now he serves like big, big.

"I wonder actually how he made it, because the serve is not that easy [of a] shot to work on, and now his serve is a big improvement for him... and kind of what I could have done better today, the serve."