Daniil Medvedev’s total collapse in Monte-Carlo
The Rock likes a big story. It also likes ugly falls, brutal swings, and the kind of slap in the face that echoes around the stands. On Wednesday, Court Rainier III watched one of those scenes people end up talking about over coffee in the clubhouse. A scoreline that hit like a brick: 6-0, 6-0. A double bagel. A match in name only. And right in the middle of the storm, a man completely lost: Daniil Medvedev.
Up against Matteo Berrettini, who had slipped all the way down to world No 90, the Russian, the world No 10, went under without a clue, without a response, without even nicking a consolation game. The Masters 1000 at the Monte-Carlo Country Club has seen its share of shocks, but this sort of breakdown doesn’t turn up often.
A vanishing act in real time
From the first few points, something was off. Medvedev looked as if he’d picked up an invisible thread that tied up his arm. Awkward depth, limp drop shots, volleys dumped into the back of the court netting… It had the feel of a grim practice session, except Berrettini was on the other side of the net, serious, tidy and clinical.
The numbers are almost painful. Twenty-seven unforced errors for Medvedev, three winners, and just nine points on his own serve. Seventeen points in all. A player who, at this level, is usually a wall, a machine, a metronome. Here, he looked like a switched-off version of himself, rattled and snapping a racket like someone throwing an empty glass at a wall.
Berrettini didn’t need to play the hero. Eight winners, a solid game, and the sense to let Medvedev dig his own grave. Game by game, point by point. 1-0 becomes 2-0, then 3-0, then 4-0, and still no sign of a fightback. At 5-0, nobody was quite ready to believe the bagel. At 6-0, nobody was expecting anything but more pain.
Then the script started again. Same story. Same mess. As if the Russian had wandered into a maze and lost the exit.
A double bagel that brings back old bruises
Last year, the Rock served up another double bagel for the crowd: Alex de Minaur against Grigor Dimitrov. This time, it’s another top-10 player caught in the trap. You have to go back to 2016 to find the last one, when Tomas Berdych also got pasted by David Goffin on the clay in Rome. Go back a bit further and another ghost looms: Roger Federer, swept aside by Gaston Gaudio at the 2005 season-ending Masters. Tennis doesn’t care who you are. Not even the icons.
A brutal contrast with 2023
What stands out most is the break from last year. Medvedev played gladiator matches here then, scraping out epic wins over Karen Khachanov and Alexandre Müller. Sharp. Scrappy. Able to twist the script when it mattered. None of that showed up on Wednesday.
Berrettini, by contrast, is grinding through a patient rebuild, and there’s something almost touching about it. He already beat Alexander Zverev at this same event last year, and he’s proving his tennis never disappeared — it was just waiting for a body that could hold up and a bit of belief. Next up is the winner of Arthur Rinderknech and Joao Fonseca. A golden chance to reach the quarter-finals.
And now?
For Medvedev, this double bagel will sit like a dark stain on his record. An oddity. A warning shot. The sort of match real champions turn into fuel. For Berrettini, it might be the start of something proper. On the Rock, stories get rewritten fast. Sometimes it takes one set. Sometimes one match. On Wednesday, it barely took any more than that.
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