Daniil Medvedev continued his good play in Beijing cruising to the semi-final of the 2023 China Open over Ugo Humbert.
Humbert bested Medvedev's good friend Andrey Rublev in the previous round, and the Russian avenged that loss with an excellent performance. Just like against Alex de Minaur, the match wasn't a perfect one, but it doesn't need to be as long you pick up the win.
There are some reasons why his matches kind of drag out, and it's the tennis balls which make it very hard to hit a winner. He talked a bit about that at this event, complaining about it, but it also helped him. His defence is really tough to break down in a situation where you can't really hit a winner often.
Both players struggled with that in the opening set as Medvedev took an early break but gave it right back. We saw the same thing happen in the next two games as well, but ultimately, the Russian broke for a 3rd time, and this time it was enough.
It wasn't a match of great stats as neither served well nor hit many winners. It was kind of a sloppy affair from both sides as they tried to navigate around some of the circumstances, giving them trouble.
Medvedev had early break points in the second but couldn't break. Humbert played a much better set overall, very sure in the rallies and actually won it 6-3, complicating the match further. It wasn't a huge surprise because it was trending that way for a while before it happened, but Medvedev remained calm and jumped out to an early lead in the final set.
He would drop his serve but break again for the 4-1 lead. Medvedev would break once more until the end setting up the final score of 6-4 3-6 6-1.
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