Alexander Zverev started the ATP Finals of the eight best tennis players of the year with a defeat. The Russian Daniil Medvedev beat Zverev in London 3: 6, 4: 6. The German hardly came into play, especially his own serve caused him problems again. Medvedev used his first match ball after 1:29 hours.
In the first game of the day, world number one Novak Djokovic celebrated a first success against the Argentinian Diego Schwartzman. The 33-year-old Djokovic prevailed 6: 3, 6: 2 and will now play against Medvedev on Wednesday. Zverev then meets Schwartzman. “I have to improve, otherwise I won’t win a game here,” said Zverev, disappointed. “I just wasn’t good enough today to beat a top ten player.”
Zverev, 2018 finals winner, actually got off to a good start against Medvedev and immediately took the serve from the Russian. But overall, Zverev never really found his rhythm in the almost deserted arena. The 23-year-old also gave his first serve and already revealed his big problems with his own service that evening. With three double errors, Zverev virtually equalized his opponent.
Old mistakes
In total, Zverev made seven double errors in the first round. Most recently, the 23-year-old seemed to have got his service problems under control. In his two tournament victories in Cologne and in the final in Paris, where he also lost to Medvedev, Zverev had served well. But at the start of the ATP Finals, Zverev fell back into old patterns. “My serve wasn’t there today. Since the restart it was one of my worst matches, «said Zverev.
Medvedev took advantage of this and took the first set after 52 minutes without even playing his best tennis. The second round remained balanced until the score was 3: 3. Then Zverev gave up his service again and had to admit defeat a little later.
