Daniil Medvedev Trying to Look up to Iga Swiatek Amid Title Drought: 'Playing Much Better Than Me'

While Iga Swiatek ended her title drought at Wimbledon, Daniil Medvedev is still waiting for his first trophy since his victory at the 2023 Italian Open. Since then, Medvedev has made it to six finals, losing all.

This season, he played one final at the Halle Open, where Alexander Bublik denied him the title. At present, Medvedev is in Cincinnati to bid for his seventh Masters 1000 title.

Ahead of the kick-starting his campaign against Australia’s Adam Walton, he sat for an interview with the Tennis Channel along with Swiatek. There, he congratulated the Pole for her Wimbledon win.

Iga is just playing great tennis. Congrats on Wimbledon. I don’t think I saw you after. She’s playing incredible, much better than me at the moment. I need to try to look up to her and keep it up.

In the grass-court Major, Swiatek won a title for the first time since her Roland Garros triumph last year. She registered a 6-0, 6-0 win over Amanda Anisimova, becoming only the second woman after Steffi Graf to win a Grand Slam final by double bageling her opponent. It was also her first title on grass as well as her second final on the surface after the Bad Homburg Open, where Jessica Pegula defeated her.

Swiatek, in her opening round, knocked out Anastasia Potapova to schedule a third-round clash with Marta Kostyuk, against whom she holds a 3-0 head-to-head lead and last met her in the fourth round of Cincinnati last year.

The six-time Grand Slam champion is chasing her 11th WTA 1000 title and also her first in Cincinnati. In the tournament, the 24-year-old is a two-time semifinalist, reaching the stage in 2023 and 2024. Last year, eventual winner Aryna Sabalenka ended her run.

While Swiatek had skipped both the Citi Open and the Canadian Open, Medvedev played both, but his run ended in the quarterfinals and the third round, respectively. At Wimbledon, the Russian ace (two-time semifinalist at SW19) succumbed to a four-set defeat in his first round. While Swiatek is chasing her first title in Cincinnati, the 2021 US Open champion lifted the title in 2019.

Daniil Medvedev compares Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz’s rivalry with the Big 3

Daniil Medvedev warned Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz about a third player, suggesting that the latter could win even more than the two young Grand Slam championships. But who that player would be, only time would tell.