The extravagant Six Kings Slam Tournament in Saudi Arabia has kicked off with a one-sided victory for Jannik Sinner over a lackluster Daniil Medvedev.
The world No.1 stormed to a 6-0, 6-3, win over the Russian who he also beat in straight sets less than a week ago at the Shanghai Masters. Sinner stormed through the opening set in less than 30 minutes to hand Medvedev his first bagel since 2020.
The second set was slightly more competitive but Sinner continued his dominance by breaking early. Medvedev had multiple chances to break back for 4-4 but failed to capitalize on those opportunities which prompted him to smash his racket out of sheer frustration. The Italian then secured victory in the following game on his second match point after his opponent hit the ball into the net.
“It was a very good performance, considering I arrived just a couple of days ago,” said Sinner.
“I had only one practice session, so I was just looking forward to coming here (to Saudi Arabia).
“It’s a very special place. It’s something very, very new.”
Coming into the event, Medvedev had been experiencing an issue with his shoulder and took medical time-outs in his two previous matches at Shanghai. However, it is unclear if this had an impact on his latest performance.
23-year-old Sinner has won seven ATP titles since January, including two Grand Slam tournaments. He has recorded 65 Tour-level wins so far in 2024 and recently secured his year-end No.1 position. Becoming the first Italian man to do so.
“I worked very hard in my very young career to be in this position,” he said.
“This is all work off of many years of work.
“I felt like that at the end of last year I was having a great run, winning the Davis Cup.
“It was very nice and winning the first Grand Slam of the year here in Australia was awesome.
“That gave me the confidence to produce some, some great tennis throughout the whole year, but also always trying to keep improving and evolve.”
Despite his defeat, Medvedev will still exit Saudi Arabia with a paycheck of $1.5M which has been given to all six participants. The champion will earn an additional $6M which is over three times more than what this year’s US Open finalists earned ($1.8M).
Meanwhile, Sinner will next play Novak Djokovic in what will be a repeat of Sunday’s final at the Shanghai Masters. Both Djokovic and Rafael Nadal have been handed first-match byes.
“Hopefully it’s going to be a great match. This is all that we are hoping for now. It doesn’t really matter. The winner.” He concluded.
