‘Comfortable on clay’ Swiatek thrashes Lesia Tsurenko to reach Rome fourth round

Pole Iga Swiatek, the top seed, beat Ukrainian Lesia Tsurenko 6-2, 6-0 to move into the fourth round of the Italian Open at the Foro Italico in Rome on Sunday.

And though she shrugged off the label of “clay-court specialist” in her post-match press conference, she agreed with a smile: “I would say I feel most comfortable on clay, yeah.”

It certainly appears so. She has lost only one match during this clay-court swing – in the Madrid final against Aryna Sabalenka – and in her two matches in Rome so far she has dropped just two games.

Swiatek, ranked No 1, will face the winner of the match between Croat Donna Vekic, the No 21 seed, and Russian Liudmila Samsonova, the No 16 seed, next.

The defending champion lost serve in her opening service game to go 2-0 down before reeling off 12 consecutive games for the second match in a row.

Swiatek: You have to play well on all surfaces

And although her form on clay is clearly sensational going into Roland-Garros, Swiatek is also looking further ahead.

“If we want to be the best in tennis, you have to play well on all these surfaces. I’m lucky enough to have the grass court season only for three weeks, but I’m still getting it. I know it’s an important part of the tour and I should be better at it.”

In the previous round of the Rome tournament, the 21-year-old Pole won against Russian Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova (6-0, 6-0).

Tsurenko, ranked No 68, won against Elina Svitolina (6-4, 6-3) and American Bernarda Pera, the No 28 seed (6-4, 6-4) in the previous rounds of the Rome tournament.

Rome WTA 1000, other third-round results (Foro Italico, clay, USD 3.572.618, most recent results first):

• Anna Kalinskaya vs. Elena Rybakina
• Donna Vekic vs. Liudmila Samsonova
• Barbora Krejcikova vs. Jelena Ostapenko
• Victoria Azarenka vs. Madison Keys
• Paula Badosa vs. Marta Kostyuk
• Coco Gauff vs. Marie Bouzkova
• Daria Kasatkina (8) beat Julia Grabher: 7-5, 4-6, 7-6 (2)
• Karolina Muchova beat Camila Giorgi: 7-6 (4), 6-2
• Marketa Vondrousova beat Maria Sakkari (9): 7-5, 6-3
• Qinwen Zheng (22) beat Anna Bondar (Q): 7-6 (2), 6-4
• Veronika Kudermetova (11) beat Anastasia Potapova (23): 7-5, 3-6, 6-1
• Beatriz Haddad Maia (12) beat Magda Linette (17): 7-5, 6-4
• Xiyu Wang beat Taylor Townsend (Q): 6-2, 0-6, 7-5
• Anhelina Kalinina (30) beat Sofia Kenin: 6-4, 6-2
• Camila Osorio (Q) beat Caroline Garcia (5): 6-4, 6-4