WTA Cincinnati: Swiatek overcomes second-set collapse to reach last 16

Playing her first match of the US hardcourt season, world No 1 Iga Swiatek overcame a second-set collapse to beat French qualifier Varvara Gracheva and reach the last 16 of the WTA Western & Southern Open.

The top-seeded Pole started the match by winning 11 of the first 13 games, going up 6-0, 5-2 and held four match points in the eighth game of the second set.

However, Gracheva saved all of them to hold to cut the lead to 5-3 and then broke the five-time Grand Slam champion to love to get the set back on serve.

Swiatek held a fifth match point in the 12th game but Gracheva saved this one too and went on to finally claim the set 10-8 in the tiebreak on her fifth set point.

After both players exchanged breaks early in the third set, Swiatek broke the Frenchwoman again in the fifth game and then won the next three games in a row, converting her sixth match point to win 6-0, 6-7 (8), 6-2 in two hours and 11 minutes. She now improves to 2-0 lifetime against Gracheva.

I’m happy that I could figure it out in the third and start playing the same kind of game as at the beginning of the match.

Iga Swiatek

Swiatek, who won the French Open in June, will play Ukrainian Marta Kostyuk, the No 15 seed, next. This was her 28th WTA 1000 match win of the season, the most for her in a single season, and only second to Serena Williams’ 36 WTA 1000 match wins in 2009. This was also her Tour-leading 53rd win of the season.

“For sure, the transition is probably the hardest, from like the slowest surface (at Roland-Garros) to the fastest surface,” Swiatek said after the win. “But that’s why I’m still happy with my performance, and looking forward to another match to kind of still do the grinding and implement what I was working on, but not really focusing on the results.”

“Well, for sure, it wasn’t easy, but I’m happy that I could have 6-0, 5-2 in my first match on hard court. But for sure, Varvara was fighting and I wasn’t able to close in second set, but I’m happy that I could figure it out in the third and start playing the same kind of game as at the beginning of the match.”

Gracheva, ranked No 69, edged out Australian Ajla Tomljanovic (6-3, 2-6, 7-6 (5)) in the previous round of the tournament.

Cincinnati WTA 1000, other second-round matches (Lindner Family Tennis Center, hard, USD 3,211,715):

• Marta Kostyuk beat Lulu Sun (Q): 6-3, 7-5
• Jessica Pegula vs. Karolina Muchova
• Anastasia Potapova vs. Jasmine Paolini
• Mirra Andreeva vs. Karolina Pliskova
• Yulia Putintseva vs. Coco Gauff
• Anna Kalinskaya vs. Paula Badosa
• Taylor Townsend vs. Daria Kasatkina
• Liudmila Samsonova vs. Magda Linette
• Aryna Sabalenka vs. Elisabetta Cocciaretto
• Ashlyn Krueger vs. Diana Shnaider
• Leylah Fernandez vs. Elena Rybakina
• Elina Avanesyan vs. Jelena Ostapenko
• Elina Svitolina vs. Jessica Bouzas Maneiro

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