Daniil Medvedev became the latest high seed to fall at the Paris Masters — losing his temper before losing his match and finishing it off with a middle finger to the crowd on Wednesday.
After second seed Carlos Alcaraz tumbled against qualifier Roman Safiullin late the previous evening, the third-seeded Medvedev lost a marathon to 17th-ranked Grigor Dimitrov, 6-3, 6-7, 7-6 on Wednesday.
At one point in the second set — in a match that lasted two hours and 54 minutes — Medvedev threatened to stop if the crowd kept whistling at him.
Dimitrov broke in the sixth game of the match on his way to the first set.
Medvedev broke in the sixth game of the second set and led 5-2 before Dimitrov fought back.
When the Bulgarian broke to 5-5, Medvedev threw his racket which brought whistles from the crowd that further upset the Russian.
“I’m not going to play when they whistle,” Medvedev shouted at the umpire who replied by telling the Russian: “The more you stop, the more it annoys them. The more they whistle.”
Medvedev still refused to go on.
“They’re stupid! If they don’t whistle, I’ll play!” Medvedev said before telling the crowd. “I play guys, but shut your mouths, okay!”
The tennis villain poured fuel on the fire as he departed the court, appearing to deliver a middle finger to those in attendance.
After a time violation warning from the umpire, Medvedev resumed and won the tie break on his first set point.
“When I throw my racket, I’m allowed to get whistled at, it’s a bad reaction,” he later told the press. “On the other hand, if I serve, and they whistle and applaud at the same time, it’s a bit weird.
“That’s the public at Bercy, everyone knows it, not everyone likes playing here. I played much better at Bercy when there was nobody there,” he said, referring to his victory in 2020 during the Covid-19 pandemic.
“Here, with me, it doesn’t connect. I’ll be back and I’ll try to do my best.”
Medvedev added that he hoped to “turn the crowd around.”
Asked if he had flipped the bird to the crowd, he replied: “I was looking at my fingernail, how could I do that in front of the friendly Paris-Bercy crowd?”
In the final set, Dimitrov took the initiative when he broke, again in the sixth game.
Medvedev saved four match points before breaking serve in the ninth game.
The Russian saved two more match points before holding in his final service game to force a tie-break.
But the Bulgarian raced to a 5-0 lead before finishing the match.
Dimitrov said he regretted letting a 40-15 lead slip on Medvedev’s serve in tenth game.
“I just didn’t go enough for my shots,” Dimitrov said. “Against a player like him, he’s going to take it, simple as that.”
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