👋 Welcome back to The Daily Theory, our morning rundown to help you stay on top of your favorite sport. I’m Allen McDuffee, your guide to all things tennis.
On tap today, we’ve got: Learner Tien’s incredible win, Ben Shelton’s lefty woes, Danielle Collins makes waves, and a whole bunch more.
Let’s tennis!
Four Points
🎾 Fast Learner: Young American qualifier Learner Tien needed five sets (after winning the first two) to take down 5th seed Daniil Medvedev in an overnight battle that lasted nearly five hours. The 19-year-old who is currently ranked 121 in the world was stubborn in not missing a ball for games on end, gutsy when he needed to go for it, and clever in keeping one of the most unpredictable players on tour on his toes. The awkward on-court interview (if you can call it that when the questions were missing), was positively hilarious. What happened from Medvedev’s perspective? Nobody knows. He never showed up to the press conference.
🎾 The hidden downside of being a lefty: After his Thursday win over Pablo Carreno Busta, Ben Shelton noted that the biggest problem of being a lefty is the inability to find a practice partner. “It’s impossible, except for when the draw comes out and they play [Jack] Draper, Shapo [Denis Shapovalov], or Ugo Humbert...Then I get the look. Other than that, people don’t want to practice with you as much.” And players wonder why they have such a hard time against lefties. 🤔
🎾 A new Lys on life: Eva Lys, the young German player who lost in the final round of qualifying, made headlines when she got in the main draw as a lucky loser just 10 minutes before taking court against Kimberly Birrell, who admitted to being more thrown off by the sudden switch than her opponent. But the headline is different now after beating Varvara Gracheva in three sets, moving into the third round against world number 82 Jaqueline Cristian — another winnable match.
🎾 Like she told us, ‘New Year, Same Me’: It may be 2025, but Danielle Collins hasn’t stopped leaning into her petty side. After defeating Australia’s Destanee Aiava 7-6 (4), 4-6, 6-2 in a lengthy battle, Collins turned to the crowd that heckled her a bit more than she was willing to take and repeatedly said, “How about that?!” before blowing kisses to them. After the match, she said: “[Those who] bought a ticket to come out here and heckle me, it’s all going toward the Danielle Collins Fund.” The other side: What should have been a lovely moment for Aiava, who has dealt with some serious mental health struggles (and sometimes quite publicly) is now marked by this.
And, that’s game.
