Medvedev takes the early shift through to second week

Daniil Medvedev had the early shift Saturday night at the Australian and he made the most of it.

Backing up from his 3:40 a.m. finish two nights ago against Emil Ruusuvuori, the 2020 Nitto ATP Finals champion opened the night session on Margaret Court Arena and ran through Felix Auger-Aliassime 6-3, 6-4, 6-3 to be done and dusted by 9:20 p.m.

“It was tough for me, especially after the last match I had,” Medvedev said. “It felt tough when I ran so I tried to give him a tough shot so he couldn’t run me so much… I wasn’t feeling 100 per cent but I tried to make my best work possible.”

Aliassime was consistently hitting a heavier ball than Medvedev, particularly in the first set, but the 2021 US Open champion was happy to absorb the pace and send back his flat effortless groundstrokes and wait for the Canadian to miss. Felix made 43 unforced errors to Medvedev's 25.

The World No. 3, who has a chance of returning to World No. 1 in the Pepperstone ATP Rankings with a title, will next play Portugal's Nuno Borges, who claimed a shock four-set win over in-form 13th seed Grigor Dimitrov.

Never forget 🇵🇹

The moment @nunoborges97 defeats Grigor Dimitrov to become the second Portuguese player in history to reach the round of 16 at a Grand Slam.@AustralianOpen | #AusOpen pic.twitter.com/VcQ6MNt4kQ

— ATP Tour (@atptour) January 20, 2024

“I still can’t believe it, what a match,” Borges said of the 6-7(3), 6-4, 6-2, 7-6(6) result in his first Lexus ATP Head2Head meeting with the Bulgarian. “I never expected to be here in the second week of Australian Open, who would have thought!

“Maybe in the third set when I got the break I thought, ‘Holy crap, I can actually win this’. I was testing my limits, testing him. Anything can happen in a tennis match and today was a true example of that.”

Before this week, Borges had not advanced past the second round of a tour-level event. He has become just the second player — man or woman — from his country to reach the fourth round at a Grand Slam tournament (Joao Sousa, two times).