Medvedev fends off Machac to reach last 16 at Roland-Garros

Daniil Medvedev got everything he could handle from an in-form Tomas Machac in the third round at Roland-Garros on Saturday afternoon, but the No 5 seed passed the test with flying colors. Medvedev prevailed 7-6 (4), 7-5, 1-6, 6-4 after three hours and 23 minutes of high-quality tennis.

Machac, who was coming off a runner-up performance in Geneva, produced the shot of the match with a left-handed pass to break serve at 2-2 in the first set. However, such heroics were not enough for the world No 34 in either the first or the second set.

Although Machac battled back to take the third set by winning six games in a row, Medvedev steadied the ship in the fourth. A break at 5-4 wrapped up the match in style for the Russian.

Thus continues marked improved for Medvedev on clay. He owns a winning percentage of 76 on this surface dating back to the start of 2023 compared to 44 percent from 2016 through 2023.

The world No 5 will play the winner of the match between Australian Alex De Minaur, the No 11 seed, and German Jan-Lennard Struff in the fourth round. He preceded Saturday’s result with wins over German Dominik Koepfer (6-3, 6-4, 5-7, 6-3) and Serb Miomir Kecmanovic (6-1, 5-0 ret.).

every time we played an important moment and he would hit a winner, I was like, ‘I just watched your match two days ago and you were missing this shot.’

Daniil Medvedev

“Today he played very strong,” Medvedev responded when asked about Machac’s level. “I think — I would say in my opinion (it was a) top-10 level. Maybe because he lost in the important moments we could say top 20. I watched his other matches. I think today was a really good match from him, because I saw in the other matches he was missing a bit more I think than today.

“So every time we played an important moment and he would hit a winner, I was like, ‘I just watched your match two days ago and you were missing this shot.’ He played good. If he plays like this, he is going up the rankings.”

Machac beat Portugal’s Nuno Borges (7-6 (3), 6-4, 6-3) and Argentina’s Mariano Navone, the No 31 seed (6-2, 6-1, 3-6, 1-6, 6-1) in the previous rounds.

“I think it was a good tournament for me,” the Czech reflected. “I won two good matches, especially the fifth set two days back. Today was also I think a great match — really close. I think it could [have been] at least a fifth set today.

“But it’s tennis. I did everything that I could, but today (it) was not enough.”

Paris (Grand Slam), other third-round results:

• Novak Djokovic vs. Lorenzo Musetti
• Tomas Martin Etcheverry vs. Casper Ruud
• Taylor Fritz vs. Thanasi Kokkinakis
• Francisco Cerundolo vs. Tommy Paul
• Hubert Hurkacz vs. Denis Shapovalov
• Jozef Kovalik vs. Holger Rune
• Zizou Bergs vs. Grigor Dimitrov
• Alexander Zverev vs. Tallon Griekspoor: saturday
• Felix Auger-Aliassime (21) beat Ben Shelton (15): 6-4, 6-2, 6-1
• Alex De Minaur vs. Jan-Lennard Struff: saturday
• Corentin Moutet beat Sebastian Ofner: 3-6, 6-4, 6-4, 6-1
• Carlos Alcaraz (3) beat Sebastian Korda (27): 6-4, 7-6 (5), 6-3
• Stefanos Tsitsipas (9) beat Zhizhen Zhang: 6-3, 6-3, 6-1
• Jannik Sinner (2) beat Pavel Kotov: 6-4, 6-4, 6-4
• Matteo Arnaldi beat Andrey Rublev (6): 7-6 (6), 6-2, 6-4

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