By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Tuesday July 2, 2024
Iga Swiatek confidently took out former Slam champion Sofia Kenin to reach round two at Wimbledon.
Photo Source: Rob Newell/Camera Sport
By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Tuesday July 2, 2024
20 was a magic number for Iga Swiatek on Tuesday at Wimbledon. Her serve, meanwhile, was the magic stroke.
In her 20th career grass court match, the top seed powered past Sofia Kenin in a battle of Grand Slam champions 6-3, 6-4, to stretch her current winning streak to 20 victories.
By doing so the Polish juggernaut becomes just the second active player to have racked up multiple win streaks of 20 or more victories, and the ninth in Open Era history to have achieved the feat by the age of 24.
It was a solid start for the World No.1, who entered Wimbledon without a single warmup match on grass, but looked anything but rusty as she won 26 of 31 first-serve points and answered the Kenin challenge with a spotless performance that featured 17 winners against 12 unforced errors and three of eight break points converted.
She says that no matter how comfortable she looked on Tuesday, there are big challenges that come with switching to a different surface and playing matches, especially at a Grand Slam.
"When you switch to any surface, first couple of matches are not going to be comfortable and you have to accept that," she said. "But looking at how I'm playing on practice court, I feel like I'm doing progress every year, and every year is a little bit faster for me, the process of adapting to the surface. So yeah, you can say I feel more comfortable. But it doesn't change the fact that it's going to be tough on this court anyway because it's a Grand Slam and you have to be ready."
From the moment she stepped on court with the Rolling Stones piping through her headphones (she shared that info with reporters in her press conference - we're pretty sure it wasn't "19th Nervous Breakdown" based on the poise with which she played), Swiatek was ready for battle on Tuesday.
Much has been said about Swiatek’s potentially difficult draw at these Championships, but on Tuesday she made it clear that she would be calling the shots, not her potential opponents at Wimbledon.
“It was a solid start and not an easy draw,” Swiatek told the crowd on No.1 Court. “There’s no time to kind of get into the tournament slowly, you need to be ready straightaway, and I’m happy that I did that today.”
Swiatek improves to 10-4 lifetime at Wimbledon, and 44-4 overall on the season with her third victory in three matches against Kenin.
She will face either Francesca Jones or Petra Martic in the second round.