Learner Tien beats Daniil Medvedev and becomes youngest US man in Australia’s 3rd round since Pete Sampras | Tennis News
Learner Tien, a 19-year-old qualifier from California, became the youngest American man to reach the Australian Open’s third round since Pete Sampras in 1990, upsetting a racket-tossing Daniil Medvedev 6-3, 7-6 (4), 6-7 (8), 1-6, 7-6 (10-7) in a match that began Thursday night and ended in the wee hours of Friday.
The 4-hour, 49-minute contest had a bit of everything, including — hard to believe — a six-minute rain delay that interrupted play shortly before 2:30 a.m. with Tien serving at 5-all, 15-all in the fifth set. When they resumed, Medvedev broke and served for the victory at 6-5, but Tien wouldn’t cede a thing, broke back, and forced the concluding first-to-10 tiebreaker that he emerged to win shortly before 3 a.m., about two hours after he failed to convert his initial match point.
The outcome was eyebrow-raising because of the wide gulf in experience and accomplishments between the two players at Margaret Court Arena. Tien is ranked 121st and owned a career Grand Slam record of 0-3 before this week; Medvedev was seeded No. 5, won the 2021 U.S. Open and was the runner-up at Melbourne Park in three of the past four years, including 12 months ago.
Because of the time difference, the match ended at about 8 a.m. on Thursday morning back home in California, and he took the microphone to speak directly to his family — he said he hoped they were tuned in on TV.
The left-handed Tien played fearlessly and almost flawlessly for stretches, surprisingly getting the better of lengthy exchanges at the baseline: Across the first two sets, he won 32 of the 51 points that lasted nine or more strokes, even coming out on top on one that went 45 shots and another that lasted 32.
Tien did not blink until he reached the precipice of far his most important win, holding a match point in the third-set tiebreaker when he led it 7-6. But Medvedev erased that with a 122 mph (196 kph) ace and eventually converted his third set point at a little past 1 a.m., then easily pushed things to the fifth set.
Medvedev was penalized a point in the third set while showing the same sorts of signs of frustration that led him to destroy a tiny camera hanging in the net smacking it with his racket during a surprisingly difficult, five-set, first-round win against an opponent ranked 418th.
After getting broken to trail 4-3 in the second set when Tien delivered a lob that landed at a baseline — not the only time he did that to his 6-foot-6 (1.98-meter) foe — Medvedev chucked his equipment toward the sideline, skidding it across the court until it reached an advertising panel near his bench. At other moments of anger, Medvedev hit a ball against the back wall, toppled a camera behind a baseline and punched his racket bag. He also voiced displeasure about being called for two consecutive foot-faults, resulting in a double-fault, during the second-set tiebreaker.
This was Medvedev’s first tournament of the season — his wife recently gave birth to their second child — and he never really displayed his best tennis. As he often does, the 28-year-old Russian shifted tactics in an attempt to change the course of things, pushing forward to the net frequently early in the third set.
Some makes Tien handed over a service break and a 4-3 lead to Medvedev in that set. But Tien broke right back, then held for a 5-4 edge after Medvedev got docked a point.
He just turned 19 last month, and now is the youngest man from the United States to get this far at the Australian Open since an 18-year-old Sampras reached the fourth round in 1990. Sampras won the U.S. Open later that year for the first of his 14 Grand Slam titles, a total that ranks fourth among men in tennis hory.
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