Sunday 22nd November 2020
There will be a premiere winner at the ATP Finals in London: Dominic Thiem and Daniil Medwedew throw the two top stars Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal out of the tournament and face each other on Sunday.
Tennis stars Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal are eliminated – Dominic Thiem and Daniil Medvedev are playing for the last title of the year at the ATP Finals. After the hard-fought semi-finals, the Austrian US Open winner Thiem as well as the Russian world number four Medvedev can celebrate a premiere success in London in the final on Sunday.
Medvedev confirmed his strong form on Saturday with the 3: 6, 7: 6 (7: 4), 6: 3 against Nadal and defeated the number two in the world for the first time. The Spaniard served to win the match in the second set, but in the end it remained that he was still missing the title at the season finale. With even more drama, Thiem previously beat the world number one Djokovic 7: 5, 6: 7 (10:12), 7: 6 (7: 5).
“After fighting so hard, I obviously want to try everything to win the title,” said Thiem. For the 27-year-old, it was his 300th victory on the ATP Tour – and a very special one. In the tie-break of the second set, the number three in the world awarded four match points. In the tie-break of the decisive round, Thiem was 0: 4 behind, a lot spoke for Djokovic – but Thiem took the risk and made everything clear with his sixth match point.
Thiem “did everything right”
“He did everything right after 4-0, he played great,” said Djokovic, who finished the tournament for Hamburg’s Alexander Zverev in the decisive group game on Friday. Thiem is in the final of the season finale for the second time in a row. “That was definitely a mental battle,” he said after the semi-finals. He was so nervous about the match balls that he had been awarded that he “trembled almost all over”, he confessed. “After my first big title in New York, I thought I was going to be a little calmer, but that was apparently a mistake,” he said. “I’m incredibly happy that I’m through.”
Djokovic and Thiem faced each other at the beginning of the season in the final of the Australian Open, in which the Serbian favorite prevailed in five sets. Djokovic was unbeaten until the Corona was canceled. Since the restart, however, he has left an ambivalent impression with his disqualification at the US Open – and has now missed a successful conclusion.
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