MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Daniel Medvedev used his racket to break a small camera attached to the net at Australian Open as he trailed Tuesday in his first round match in the main stadium.
Medvedev, seeded No. 5, was the 2021 US Open Champion and is a triple finalist at Melbourne Parkincluding a year ago. He didn’t play his best against Kasidit Samrej, a Thai wild card ranked 418th and making his Grand Slam debut.
The camera-destroying racket swings occurred in what would be the final game of the third set, which Samrej claimed took a two-sets-to-one lead in the best-of-five match.
Medvedev lost a point and went to the net, then thrust his racket with all his might no less than four times, coming into contact with a small black camera that shattered, sending pieces flying.
Medvedev received a warning from the chair umpire. Soon enough, Medvedev had dropped that set, leaving him with plenty of work to do to avoid a huge upset in his first match of the 2025 season.
Samrej was trying to become the lowest-ranked man to knock out a top-five player at a Grand Slam tournament since the computerized ATP rankings began in 1973, according to the International Tennis Federation.
Tuesday’s most important result was when No. 234 Alex Kim defeated No. 4 Yevgeny Kafelnikov at the 2002 Australian Open.
Samrej earned a place in this year’s Australian Open bracket by competing in four rounds of the wild-card playoffs for the Asia-Pacific region in November. He had never played anyone ranked higher than 78th until Tuesday and had never beaten anyone ranked higher than 157th.
Samrej was treated by a trainer for a left leg problem late in the fourth set, which Medvedev seized to force the match into the fifth.
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