{"id":434317,"date":"2026-01-24T11:19:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-24T11:19:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/434317\/"},"modified":"2026-01-24T11:19:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-24T11:19:07","slug":"ao-2026-day-8-preview-medvedev-tien-set-for-second-act","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/434317\/","title":{"rendered":"AO 2026 Day 8 preview: Medvedev, Tien set for second act"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Down two sets against Fabian Marozsan at Australian Open 2026 on Friday afternoon, <a href=\"https:\/\/ausopen.com\/players\/daniil-medvedev\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Daniil Medvedev<\/a> happened to glance at the scoreboard.<\/p>\n<p>It showed that <a href=\"https:\/\/ausopen.com\/players\/united-states-america\/learner-tien\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Learner Tien<\/a> won his match, meaning Medvedev would face the American once again at Melbourne Park if he rallied against Marozsan.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/ausopen.com\/schedule#!43232\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">MORE: Day 8 schedule of play<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The three-time Melbourne Park finalist did, prompting the fourth instalment in the pair\u2019s already riveting rivalry despite the small sample size.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI kind of don&#8217;t like to play him, but he must hate to play me as well,\u201d said Medvedev. \u201cIt&#8217;s long, brutal rallies\u201d but Medvedev vowed to \u201cenjoy it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere&#8217;s going to be a lot of shot making, a lot of good defence from both of us, some passing shots, etcetera.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/ausopen.com\/draws#!mens-singles\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">MORE: AO 2026 men&#8217;s singles draw<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Medvedev admitted that he underestimated the left-handed Californian 12 months ago in the second round of Australian Open 2025.<\/p>\n<p>Back then, Tien was a qualifier competing in his maiden Australian Open. <a href=\"https:\/\/ausopen.com\/articles\/news\/late-night-learner-american-teen-tien-stuns-medvedev-ao-epic\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">But he stunned Medvedev in a fifth-set tiebreak in nearly five hours<\/a>, showing his mettle by recovering from a missed match point in the third set.<\/p>\n<p>The classic ended at about 3am local time, with a famished Tien later treating himself to pizza.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>Medvedev subsequently dipped in Grand Slams and overall \u2013 recovering after the US Open \u2013 as Tien kept climbing.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI remember my leg was hurting really bad,\u201d Tien, now the No.25 seed, reflected on Friday.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy mind was in a million places, but mostly happy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Their two other meetings, in Beijing and Shanghai in back-to-back tournaments on the Asian swing, also went the distance.<\/p>\n<p>A cramping Medvedev retired in Beijing after two-and-a-half hours before cramps surfaced in the rematch. Yet Medvedev overcame his distress, prevailing in three hours.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe both don&#8217;t make it easy on our opponents. So, naturally, we&#8217;re not making it easy on each other,\u201d said Tien, almost bundled out in the first round when he trailed fellow Californian Marcos Giron 2-1 in sets and by a break, 4-3, in the fourth.<\/p>\n<p>Medvedev, a former No.1, said the 20-year-old could become a future No.1.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Down two sets against Fabian Marozsan at Australian Open 2026 on Friday afternoon, Daniil Medvedev happened to glance&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":434318,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[565],"tags":[64,63,85,747],"class_list":["post-434317","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434317","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=434317"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434317\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/434318"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=434317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=434317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=434317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}