After battling verbally with the chair umpire, crowd and even ball kids during his Australian Open final, Daniil Medvedev wasn’t done.
The Russian was seen mouthing the words ‘boring’ while standing in the background early in the trophy ceremony after the men’s singles final.
Tennis Australia chair Jayne Hrdlicka was delivering the opening speech after Rafael Nadal’s five-set win when she began to address Medvedev.
Medvedev didn’t appear to enjoy the message, pulling faces and turning to the side to say “boring” to no one in particular.
He then repeated it before muttering something that couldn’t easily be lip-read but quite clearly wasn’t positive.
The Russian star, while thanking Tennis Australia CEO Craig Tiley, said: “I want to thank Tennis Australia, especially Craig. I think tournament director is a tough job, and this year, you will be able to tell me if it was the toughest in your career. I think you are an amazing tournament director, and I hope you stay at least 15 years that I am here, or maybe 10 years.”
By tough, he most likely meant Novak Djokovic’s visa fiasco.
Medvedev did not have a great time with the crowd of Australia. In his speech after losing the match, he talked about many things but did not thank the Australian Open crowd.
While talking about the reality of the most testing loss of his career, having already thanked his team during the speech, Medvedev appeared to be building up to thank the crowd, beginning, “Last but not least”, before saying, “just wanted to thank my team again.”
Twitterati reacted to his trolling.
Even in the post-match media talk, Medvedev was lamenting about crowd’s behaviour. He said: “Before Rafa serves even in the fifth set, there would be somebody like one guy screaming, ‘C’mon Daniil’ but a thousand people would be ‘Tsss, Tsss, Tsss’. That sound. It’s disappointing, it’s disrespectful. I’m not sure I’m going to want to play tennis.”
Earlier in the semi-final, Medvedev got involved into a heated exchange with match referree, calling him ‘stupid’ and ‘bad’.
