Iga Swiatek suffers a first defeat on clay to Ostapenko in Stuttgart

 

What can I say about this matchup that hasn't been said already. She remains Iga's kryptonite.

Something about Iga's ball that Ostapenko absolutely loves. I swear, she sees Iga on her side of the draw brings out her best tennis and then wins nothing for weeks. 

6-0 H2H now, she's basically living in Iga's head rent free. 

I decided not to watch this match (didn't feel like torturing myself and going through a rollercoaster of emotions at 7 am on Easter weekend).

Having said that I was glad to see some fight back in this one, winning the 2nd set (a  final score line of 3/6 6/3 2/6) , it gives me hope for the outdoor (real) clay to come. 

Shows me that she's still more capable and comfortable finding solutions on clay then anywhere else. 

Hopefully the first serve will start working again too (so she can get more free points) because that was a weakness today. 

I can't help but wonder whether that's the Ostapenko effect too, she just tenses up more and can't serve more freely ends up with more doubles. 

Could very much be as simple as never actually being able to beat this one player on the entire WTA tour. 

I still believe once she does that H2H will turn around. 

It'd also help if they played more than once a year (this year being the exception of twice thus far).

There's going to be a lot of obvious pressure on Iga in the next month having won all the upcoming tournaments of Madrid, Rome and Roland Garros last year. 

Highly unlikely she'll be able to defend them all but I still have huge hopes for Rome and RG (even if she were to somehow have to face Ostapenko there too). 

Contrary to the opinions of people on social media, Stuttgart clay is different to Rome and Roland Garros the outdoor conditions make it so. It is less slippery and slower. 

And no I'm not using that as an excuse for this loss. 

I'm just stating facts that indoor conditions like this do favor someone like Ostapenko. 

Simple as that. 

And yes Jelena herself has stated she has won Roland Garros before (in 2017) which I swear she said in her post match just to rile up all of us Iga fans out there. 

But until Ostapenko shows consistency and wins Roland Garros more than once I'm still betting on Iga regardless of whether they play or not.