Medvedev’s harsh warning at the US Open: “A player will end up dying”

The third seeded Daniel Medvedev, overcame brutal heat and a fierce Andrei Rublev to make their way to the semifinals of the US Open on Wednesday with a 6-4 6-3 6-4 victory over his daughter’s godfather, who for the ninth time hit the wall of a Grand Slam quarterfinal.

On another hot day with temperatures reaching 32 degrees Celsius (90 Fahrenheit), Medvedev was better able to deal with the sweltering humidity and heat inside Arthur Ashe Stadium than he was. Rublev, seeded eighth, to reach the semifinals at Flushing Meadows for the fourth time in five years.

Despite winning, Medvedev Not happy playing in such difficult conditions, the 2021 champion complained to the camera as he wiped off sweat in the third set: “You can’t imagine it, a player will end up dying and then they’ll see”.

For Rublev it was a familiar ending to a Grand Slam, made all the more painful when he fell to his good friend Medvedev for the third time, and second at the US Open.

Rublev He has played in the quarterfinals of a Grand Slam nine times, and has lost in all of them. Medvedev he also eliminated him in the same phase of the 2020 US Open and the 2021 Australian Open.

The match between Russians lacked the emotion and drama of the duel between Frances Tiafoe and Ben Shelton hours earlier, but the spectacle of two top seeds battling each other and the elements was no less riveting. “The only good thing I see in these conditions is that both suffer”said Medvedev. “Honestly, at the end of the first set I kind of couldn’t see the ball anymore”he added.

Sometimes, before the points, he told me: “Wow, looks like he can’t run anymore”… but he was there all the time and I thought: “Dammit, when is he going to get tired?”said Medvedev. “But we were actually tired all the time.”

“So yeah, it’s been brutal conditions and super hard to win.”