Iga Swiatek's Wimbledon journey ends in another 3rd round exit

World No.1 Iga Swiatek summed up her frustration perfectly after her third-round loss to Yulia Putintseva at Wimbledon. The 22-year-old is the dominant force on the Hologic WTA Tour. She has won more than anyone else over the last three seasons. Just four weeks ago, she captured her third consecutive Roland Garros title and fifth Grand Slam overall.

And now, just three matches later, she saw her 21-match win streak -- 19 of which were built on her favored clay -- come to a listless end. After taking the first set over Putintseva, she lost 12 of the next 15 games.

"For me going from this kind of tennis where I felt like I'm playing the best tennis in my life to another surface where I kind of struggle a little bit more, it's not easy," Swiatek told reporters after the loss.

"All that stuff really combines to me not really having a good time in Wimbledon."

For the third consecutive year, Wimbledon feels like a penalty Swiatek is forced to accept for her clay-court supremacy. It remains the only Slam at which she has yet to make it past the quarterfinals, which she has done just once.

In 2022, she saw her 37-match win streak end in the third round to Alizé Cornet. Last year, she cut her R&R short to play a pre-Wimbledon tournament and went on to post her best result so far in the quarterfinals.

This year, she did not play a pre-tournament event but she also didn't do much resting. As a result, Swiatek admitted to feeling the mental strain. For a player who won two tournaments during the clay season from match-points down, she struggled to find her fight.

"My tank of really pushing myself to the limits became suddenly, like, empty," Swiatek said. "I was kind of surprised. But I know what I did wrong after Roland Garros. I didn't really rest properly. I'm not going to make this mistake again.

"After such a tough clay court season, I really must have my recovery. Maybe that's also the reason."

Swiatek was hoping she would be able to transfer her confidence and level to grass after a few matches, and that may have proven true if she could navigate her way through the first week. She plays her best when she's allowed to tap into her intuition and instincts, which only works if she's feeling confident.

But Swiatek never looked in full flow in the first week and Putintseva was able to expose her insecurities on the surface. Swiatek has prided herself in her improved ability on clay and hard courts to adjust tactically throughout a match and to deploy a Plan B or C.

Grass still requires a different equation for the World No.1. Swiatek's frustrations were evident as Putintseva took control of the match. She just couldn't get out of her own way and find a solution.

"I feel like on grass I need little bit more of that energy to keep being patient and accept some mistakes," Swiatek said. "Like mentally, I didn't really do that well on this tournament. I need to recover better after clay court season, both physically and mentally."

"I literally came back to work -- not tennis-wise, but off-court stuff -- and I shouldn't have done that. Maybe next year I'm going to take a vacation and literally just do nothing."

Swiatek isn't one to let a loss linger. In a season that has already seen her secure five Hologic WTA Tour titles, this was just her fifth loss of the year. She is an outstanding 45-5 on the season.

"I lost in the third round," Swiatek said. "I felt like I underachieved a little bit.

"But it's tennis, so you have to move on. I'll have many more chances this year to show my game. I'll just focus on that."

wtatennis.com

Honestly as sad as I initially was about this loss, it may just be a blessing in disguise when it comes to Olympic preparation. 

It'll give her a bit more time to rest and switch her mind and body on to her preferred surface of clay. 

Would I have liked for her to go further this year? of course (I was hoping for at least the quarterfinals) but knowing grass is still not a surface she's comfortable on I kept my expectations fairly low. 

I did see huge improvements in regards to the new service motion and grass so that's one great positive, the rest is simply a work in progress. 

I think not playing a warm up tournament probably didn't do her any favors (last year she played better when she did). 

But with the grass season being so short it's understandable she wanted to decompress more. She won 3 tournaments back to back on the dirt. I mean that's the stuff of legends really. 

The media and fans are unsurprisingly giving her a lot of flack, but they also forget it took even the G.o.a.t.s. time to figure this surface out. 

Serena Williams had plenty of week one exits before she finally won it for the first time, so did players with a game suited for the green stuff like Ash Barty. 

So I think in that sense everyone needs to ease up, she's 23 years old and has plenty of time to plan her schedule better and adapt on this surface in the near future. 

With hopefully a more favorable draw where she can actually play her way into the 2nd week.

Not that the tour makes it easy with all the big tournaments being 2 weeks now leaving even less rest time for players to recover. 

Not to mention that this year she made it no secret Olympics were her priority. And why shouldn't they be, she actually has a real chance at it this year. 

It's being played in Paris on clay her fave place and surface in the world. 

So I say Wimbledon can wait. And selfishly I'm actually glad she went out early given how many players got injured in week 1 with either, leg, thigh or shoulder issues which stemmed from falls or slips on the grass. 

Even poor Hubi Hurkacz who's Iga's mixed doubles partner at the Olympics did something to his knee (I'm still praying he'll recover in time to be able to play).  

While I hated that Iga lost to Putinseva of all people that also turned out to be a blessing because she would have had to play Jelena Ostapenko in the quarters who she already has a 0-4 record against so why possibly make that gap larger. 

Jelena probably already feels like she owns Iga (for now) this would have just made her more unbearable. Iga definitely dodged a huge bullet in that sense. 

While Iga's Wimbledon journey may have been short I'm now very much looking forward to her Olympic one. 

I want her to have a good run and hopefully win a medal (then I'll be able to finally erase the image of her weeping into a towel at the Tokyo Olympics a few years back).

Rest up Iga, plenty of great prizes still up for grabs this year. 

On to the next one.

Jazda.

Side note: I'll now be rooting for either former French Open Champion Barbora Krejcikova or this year's French Open runner up Jasmine Paolini to win in their semis tomorrow. 

And for one of them to win it all. 

Sadly 2-time finalist Ons Jabeur didn't make it far  year either. As long as Elena Rybakina isn't the one holding the trophy on Saturday I'll be ecstatic for whoever takes it. 

I do have a soft spot for the aforementioned 2 though. 

Iga Swiatek into another 3rd round at Wimbledon

 

World No.1 Iga Swiatek started and finished her afternoon on Centre Court in business mode, dispatching Croatian Petra Martic 6-4, 6-3 on Thursday.

Make that ‘game, set, match, Swiatek’ for a tour-leading 45th time this season. With only four defeats in 2024, the ultra-focused, perfection-seeking Pole will take some stopping at The Championships in this form.

Swiatek has now also claimed victory in her past 18 Grand Slam second-round encounters to book a last 32 battle with recent Birmingham champion Yulia Putintseva.


“For sure I’m happy. It wasn’t easy because Petra is changing the rhythm a lot, she’s playing a lot of top spin, she’s playing slice and I needed to adjust quickly,” claimed Swiatek, extending her winning streak to 21 matches.

“It’s not the first time I’ve come into this tournament with a ‘streak,’ it’s not that easy to have this baggage on your shoulders. This year feels different. I don’t feel like everyone is focusing on it. Two years ago was a lot harder when it was 30 something matches (37).

“I know I’m now playing on a different surface, that brings different challenges and I’m just focusing on them and not on the statistics.”

The dedicated ‘Swiftie’ (Taylor Swift fan, if you’ve been hiding under a rock) subtly used a track off the American superstar’s ‘1989’ album to describe her current grass court development.

“I want to get better here, on grass. I don’t feel like I need to prove anything, because it’s a totally different story. I’m just starting with a ‘blank space’ and going with it.

“I feel like I’m making progress on grass, especially on the practice court and my goal is to implement it on matches. I have really low expectations, I’m focusing on the work and the results will come after.”

Heading onto court, the top seed knew she had prevailed in all three of their previous meetings, including a 6-2, 7-5 triumph over Martic in the Wimbledon third round last summer. It was a fairly similar tale on Thursday.

Both players were pinging the ball across the net with some ferocious power.

Martic, competing in a milestone 50th major, sent out a warning signal with a forehand arrowed down the line at 2-2. Swiatek’s short, sharp response was to serve and strike consecutive forehand winners. So efficient, so clinical.

The champion instincts clicked in at 5-4, Swiatek stepped in and swatted away a catalogue of hot shot groundstrokes to steal away the opener.

Into the second set, at 2-1, the 23-year-old split stepped, struck a forehand and froze for a second to admire the mathematics. The ball landed in the crossover between the baseline and tramline. It was that kind of day.

Swiatek was turning the screw, probing for a pivotal breakthrough, but Martic was doing a stellar job of holding until 4-3. Three passing shots in the game exemplified Swiatek’s growing confidence on the surface. Passing Martic, passing the test, Swiatek was soon saluting the Wimbledon crowd once again.

wimbledon.com

18 - Iga Swiatek has made the R32 for the 18th consecutive Women’s Singles Grand Slam: in the Open Era, only Martina Navratilova (35), Conchita Martinez (30), Arantxa Sanchez Vicario (25) and Steffi Graf (19) had more in a row. Law.

21 - Iga Swiatek has become the first player to win more than 20 consecutive matches as World No. 1 since Serena Williams between the WTA Finals 2014 and Madrid 2015. Reigning.

Honestly can't say I'm a fan of Putinseva, I tend to avoid her matches because I find her extremely annoying. 

Her making fan of Iga as she served in one of their recent meetings on hard court didn't help change my mind on that. 

Her game is unpredictable as her personality, dropshots slices changes of rhythm. Iga will definitely have her work cut out, but if she keeps her cool I believe she can come through it (even with Putinseva winning a recent title on grass).

Iga Swiatek extends win streak to 20 with first round Wimbledon win

Much has been made of the rare break Iga Swiatek enjoyed from competition after her latest Grand  Slam triumph at Roland-Garros.

While her counterparts were rediscovering their best grass-court tennis, the world No.1 was decompressing from a heady period that earlier included consecutive WTA 1000-level titles in Madrid and Rome. After watching a Taylor Swift concert in Liverpool, Swiatek said it took three days to return to her normal sleeping patterns.

If that created questions about how the No.1 seed would fare on her return to the All England Club, Swiatek answered them emphatically.

With her 6-3, 6-4 victory over Sofia Kenin, Swiatek recorded her 20th straight match win – becoming the only active player on the WTA Tour, alongside Venus Williams, to secure multiple winning streaks of that number.

And as she entered the match against Kenin in her 110th week at world No.1, the Polish superstar provided many reminders of her dominance.

While Swiatek vastly outranks the No.49 American, she is far too clever a player to be fooled by the disparity in numbers. Their No.1 court meeting was the only first round pairing between two Grand Slam champions.

Swiatek claimed the first of her five majors at Roland-Garros in 2020, Kenin triumphing at the Australian Open earlier that year. And despite their different trajectories since those breakthroughs, Swiatek was well aware of the dangers Kenin posed on grass.

In 2023, the American pulled off one of the biggest shocks by stunning No.7 seed Coco Gauff in the first round.

Swiatek was therefore wise to assert her early authority against Kenin, showcasing her most efficient tennis as she raced to a 2-0 lead and dropped serve only once to secure the first set in 37 minutes.

The 25-year-old Kenin elevated her intensity in the second set. But with her confidence growing, a dialled-in Swiatek required only the briefest lapse to capitalise. She claimed another break of serve and consolidated to build a 5-3 advantage. Helped by consecutive aces, she calmly served out the match in the 10th game.

“It was a solid start and not an easy draw, so I'm happy that I have a chance to play another match here,” said Swiatek, now a winner of all three matches she’s contested against Kenin.

“Now on the WTA it's pretty easy to play against Grand Slam champions, even in first rounds, so you have to be ready for everything. These are experienced players so there's no time to get into the tournament slowly. You need to be ready straight away. So I'm happy that I did that today.”

With victory secured in an hour and 19 minutes, Swiatek could look to other notable numbers. Her 17 winners comfortably outnumbered Kenin’s nine, and the Pole saved three of the four break points that she faced.

Arguably even more impressive is Swiatek's 44 match wins this season – not that the 23-year-old is dwelling on those statistics as she aims to find her best form at SW19.

She suffered her only first-round loss at a Grand Slam at Wimbledon in 2019, and her quarter-final appearance in 2023 is her best performance at The Championships.

“Honestly, on this surface, it's not about the result for me but about the process and kind of how that I feel,” said Swiatek.

“I'm doing things better than last year, so I'm not really looking at numbers or statistics, trying to just be better every day. For sure matches are different because there's a little bit more attention and everything, but on the practice court, I feel like every year I'm playing a little bit better on grass.”

It ensures that Swiatek will bring a dangerously relaxed mindset into her second round against Britain’s Francesca Jones or Petra Martic of Croatia.

“Obviously I had a great beginning of the season," she added. "So I feel like I can come here and kind of not worry about points or anything and just focus on what I want to focus (on)."

wimbledon.com