Nick Kyrgios knocks out defending US Open champion Daniil Medvedev, Nick Kyrgios took nearly four hours to see off his opponent and reach the final eight in New York. Australian tennis star Nick Kyrgios has beaten world number one Daniil Medevdev to reach the quarter-finals of the US Open.
Kyrgios,
ranked 25th in the world, flirted with the self-destruct button at
times and took part in a heated exchange with umpire Eva Asderaki-Moore.
But he overcame the odds to prevail 7-6 (13-11) 3-6 6-3 6-2.
During
the match in New York, Medvedev fumed at the umpire for not warning
Kyrgios after the Australian, frustrated at going down an early break in
the second set, went within centimetres of hitting a ball into the
first row of the stands, and likely a spectator.
Medvedev
then threatened to quit if someone from Kyrgios's courtside entourage
was not ejected for disrupting the top seed between his first and second
serves.
"They cannot do it," Medvedev raged.
"If they do it a second time, I am not playing they're out, until somebody is out."
After levelling the match at a set apiece, Medvedev received an extraordinary, possibly unprecedented, gift from Kyrgios.
After
looking to have earned a break point in the second game of the third
set, when Medvedev couldn't return a ball, Kyrgios ran around the net
celebrating and hit the ball away for a mock winner.
Quite
rightly, though, Asderaki-Moore awarded the point to Medvedev because
the Russian's shot, while clearly not going over the net, was "still in
play".
"I thought it was legal," Kyrgios
said, shaking off the blunder, somewhat uncharacteristically, before
breaking Medvedev on his next service game to claim a 3-1 lead, then
going on to seize a two-sets-to-one lead.
Kyrgios will go on to play another Russian, Karen Khachanov, in the quarter-final on Wednesday.
