Medvedev Earns Clinical Raonic Win To Reach Paris Final
Daniil Medvedev advanced to his first final in 13 months on Saturday, as he defeated Milos Raonic 6-4, 7-6(4) at the Rolex Paris Masters.
The third seed saved six of seven break points to reach his maiden championship match in Paris. Medvedev is through to his fourth ATP Masters 1000 final (2-1).
Medvedev entered the tournament searching for form, following five losses from his past eight matches. But the World No. 5 has rediscovered his best level at the Accor Arena with victories against Kevin Anderson, Alex de Minaur, Diego Schwartzman and Raonic.
[WATCH LIVE 1]The two-time Nitto ATP Finals qualifier improved to 3-0 in his ATP Head2Head series against Raonic. Medvedev also earned quarter-final wins against the Canadian in Tokyo in 2018 and in Brisbane last year.
Raonic was attempting to reach his second Masters 1000 final of the year. The 29-year-old, who finished as runner-up at the Western & Southern Open in August, owns a 23-9 record this season.
Medvedev will meet top seed Rafael Nadal or fourth seed Alexander Zverev in the championship match. The 24-year-old trails Nadal 0-3 in their ATP Head2Head series and owns one win from six matches against Zverev.
Despite facing one of the most dominant servers on the ATP Tour, it was Medvedev who cruised through his service games in the first set. The Russian dropped just one point behind his first serve (16/17) and committed only three unforced errors in the opener. Medvedev secured the crucial break at 2-2 as he extended rallies and attacked Raonic’s forehand to extract errors.
After saving three break points at 3-4, Medvedev pushed Raonic out of position with deep returns to break serve at 5-5 and serve for the match. But Raonic came to the net and capitalised on forehand errors from his opponent to force a tie-break.
Medvedev showed patience from the baseline to race into a 4/0 tie-break lead and closed the match with strong serving. On his first match point, the Moscow-native came to the net and struck an overhead winner.