No. 3 seed Iga Swiatek advanced to her third straight Cincinnati Open quarterfinal with a 6-4, 6-3 defeat over Sorana Cirstea in 1 hour and 35 minutes.
Swiatek improved to 5-0 overall against Cirstea, and has now won 10 consecutive sets against the Romanian. The only occasion on which Cirstea managed to take Swiatek to three sets was in their first meeting at the 2022 Australian Open, which Swiatek won 5-7, 6-3, 6-3.
Cincinnati is one of only three WTA 1000 events on the current calendar that Swiatek has played without yet reaching the final. She was a semifinalist here in both of the past two years, falling to Coco Gauff at that stage in 2023 and Aryna Sabalenka last year. She will next face either No. 12 seed Ekaterina Alexandrova or No. 28 seed Anna KalinskayaSwiatek keeps nose in front: Swiatek made a lightning-fast start to the match, hammering three clean winners en route to an immediate break -- a lead she maintained for the whole of the first set.
A pair of double faults from Cirstea handed the Pole an immediate lead in the second set as well, but Swiatek repaid the favor with two of her own in the subsequent game. Swiatek took a 4-1 lead before dropping serve for a second time, but was able to keep her nose in front and closed out her first match point with a forehand winner.
It was Swiatek's 24th winner of the match compared to Cirstea's nine.
In Swiatek's words: Despite her commanding head-to-head lead, Swiatek did not take her opponent for granted.
"We played many tough matches, so I know Sorana can really hit the ball well -- especially on faster surfaces," she said. "So I was ready. I'm happy I was solid enough. I was trying to be proactive with my serve -- not many of my first serves went in, but I was happy I was solid on my second serves."
Not bad first couple of rounds from Iga. Sure she's still very clearly getting used to the balls and conditions of Cincy (not to mention the oppressive heat).
Which is probably why she hasn't quite found her serve here yet. But all in all fairly solid performances.
I never know what to expect with Kalinskaya honestly, one minute she plays lights out, the next she plays like crap or retires or something.
So hard to say how this meeting will go. It has been a while since they last met (where Iga lost), so hopefully this time things will be a lot more even with all of Iga's experience behind her.
She will definitely need that serve to click a little more (because 50 percent probably won't cut it with Kalinskaya nor would it with Saba or Rybakina) who would be her next possible opponents.
I thought this performance was particularly impressive given Iga had 4 days off due to Kostyuk giving her a walkover.
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