Top-seeded Daniil Medvedev on Sunday hobbled into the fourth round of the Miami Open, defying crippling leg cramps to beat Australian Alexei Popyrin 7-6 (7/3), 6-7 (7/9), 6-4.
World No. 2 Medvedev, increasingly hampered as the third set wore on, nevertheless mustered the only service break of the third set on the way to a dramatic victory over 86th-ranked Popyrin in the hard-court tournament.
“It’s probably one of the sweetest victories in my career, because I was cramping like hell,” Medvedev said. “There were moments where I just wanted to lie down and say: ‘OK, it’s over,’ but I couldn’t accept that.”
Photo: AFP
Medvedev had appeared to be cruising to the finish line when he seized a 5-2 lead in the second set.
Popyrin held serve for 5-3, but since Medvedev had not faced a break point in the match, another hold seemed a mere formality.
Instead, Medvedev was broken to love in a game that featured a double fault and three superb forehand winners from Popyrin.
Popyrin fell to 0-40 in the next game, but an ace from Medvedev erased three match points.
Medvedev saved two set points in the tiebreak before Popyrin leveled the match with a forehand winner on his third set point.
Medvedev next faces unseeded American Frances Tiafoe, who beat 16th-seeded Dusan Lajovic of Serbia 1-6, 7-5, 6-3.
WOMEN’S SINGLES
Second-seeded Naomi Osaka of Japan reached the fourth round for the first time, without lifting a racquet, when scheduled opponent Nina Stojanovic withdrew with a right-thigh injury.
The US and Australian Open champion — who could overtake world No. 1 Ashleigh Barty in the rankings with a title victory if the Australian fails to reach the final — next faces 16th-seeded Belgian Elise Mertens, who defeated Anett Kontaveit of Estonia 6-2, 0-6, 6-2.
Spain’s Garbine Muguruza, a two-time Grand Slam winner who ended a two-year title drought in Dubai this month, dropped the first set on the way to a 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 victory over Anna Kalinskaya.
Muguruza next faces eighth-seeded Bianca Andreescu of Canada, a 7-6 (7/4), 6-7 (2/7), 6-4 winner over Amanda Anisimova of the US.
Fourth-seeded Sofia Kenin of the US was eliminated by 27th seed Ons Jabeur of Tunisia 6-4, 4-6, 6-4.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier