Daniil Medvedev returned to the courts today in Geneva and as expected the Russian struggled against a very solid Gasquet 2-6 6-7(5).
Medvedev missed the majority of the clay season after having a procedure done earlier in the season for a hernia and in his first match back, he did not look that good. Gasquet is a longtime resident of Geneva and knows the courts rather well. The familiarity with the surface and the condition was clearly evident early on as Medvedev struggled to find his footing.
He did not move that well and a lot of his shots sailed wide which was a problem. Most of those rallies were crucial and Medvedev simply got outplayed by Gasquet in the crucial rallies. He lost the opening one 2-6 and showed a bit more fight in the 2nd set. Gasquet opened with a 2-0 lead but a small chance gave Medvedev the tie.
On break point, Gasquet committed a double fault and that inserted Medvedev with some energy. He played better and won his service games with ease. Gasquet did the same and we ended up in a tiebreak where the Frenchman outplayed Medvedev in crucial rallies. The Russian lost patience a couple of times and forced the issue missing badly. He did that on match point as well committing a double fault.