Daniil Medvedev brushed aside unseeded Nuno Borges 6-0, 6-1, 6-3 to advance to the quarterfinals of the US Open with a dominant display at Arthur Ashe Stadium on Monday.
Medvedev, the No. 5 seed and the only former champion remaining in the men’s draw, had no trouble in the opening set against Borges, using his powerful baseline returns and his movement at the net to win all but 11 points.
The manner of the victory was a far cry from the same stage at the Australian Open, where Borges managed to take a set off Medvedev, as here he made 10 double faults and 51 unforced errors.
“To be honest, he played worse [than in Melbourne],” Medvedev told reporters. “Even by the stats he made a lot of unforced errors, a lot of double faults. Everyone is doing double faults here, probably something to do with condition of the balls.
“Especially in some games, it was maybe two or three, so this gives you an easy break. I managed again to serve much better than the days before, so I didn’t give him this opportunity to break back. It’s a little bit of extra pressure.”
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As Medvedev, the 2021 champion, whitewashed Borges in the opening set, he toyed with the Portuguese who was no match for the towering Russian.
Borges finally got on the board in the second set, earning a round of applause as he went up 1-0.
But the rest of the set was more of the same as Borges made several unforced errors and Medvedev took a two-set lead.
The crowd did get behind Borges, who briefly flipped the script and took the lead in the third set, but a fire alarm led to a brief pause in play and Medvedev recovered to win five of the next six games to wrap up the contest.
Medvedev will next play either top seed Jannik Sinner or American Tommy Paul.
“Tommy has been playing unbelievable this year,” said Medvedev. “With Jannik, we had some unbelievable battles — if I play him, it’s probably going to be physical for both of us.”
In other men’s action Monday, No. 25 Jack Draper became the first British man to reach the quarterfinals in New York since the recently retired Andy Murray in 2016.
Draper, who exited in the fourth round a year ago, will appear in his first Slam quarterfinal thanks to a 6-3, 6-1, 6-2 win against unseeded Tomas Machac.
“I obviously miss Andy. Shoutout to Andy,” Draper said. “What an unbelievable career the guy’s had. Just an icon of the game. I miss him in the change rooms. I miss being next to his stinky shoes and all his stinky clothes.”
Draper will next take on No. 10 seed Alex de Minaur or Jordan Thompson.
Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
