No. 1 seed Iga Sviatek booked her spot in the fourth round of the Internazionali BNL d’Italia with a 6-3, 6-4 win over Yulia Putintseva, extending her winning streak with a 4-1 loss in the second set. eight matches.
The two-time Rome champion is looking to build on his maiden Madrid title last week with a third in the Italian capital, making him only the third player to win both Rome and Madrid in the same year. She took another step towards that goal with her fourth victory over Putintseva in as many matches, all of them in straight sets.
However, the 1-hour, 46-minute contest was the toughest of those wins to date. Putintseva again found success with her trademark forehand and scored four points to take a 5-1 lead in the second set. Sviatek needed all of his stamina to survive multiple games.
What makes Putintseva such a tough opponent – and how does Sviatek handle her so well?
With 11 top 10 wins and WTA 1000 quarterfinal appearances in Miami and Madrid this year, Putintseva thrives on being a thorn in the side of stronger opponents. Swiatek was on the receiving end of that time; Even his famous speed couldn’t keep up with some of Kazakhstan’s fine shots.
“He’s a tough opponent because he changes rhythm a lot,” Swiatek said afterward. “He’s also, as you saw today, play differently. He was two yards behind the baseline on a rebound, which he hasn’t done before. He can mix it up. He’s got a good touch. I think that’s what makes him. Dangerous.”
As dangerous as Putintseva is, the story of the day was ultimately Sviatek’s continued dominance of their attack.
“I just wanted to stay on my ‘solid game’ and balance the risk,” he said. “And also know that sometimes it doesn’t make sense to play too hard because he’ll use your strength anyway. I think I can do that well. I’ve done it before when I played against him. Even today.”
Who has managed the Madrid/Rome double in the past and is he on Swiatek’s radar this year?
Only two players have won Madrid and Rome in the same year. In 2009, the first year that Madrid was held at the WTA 1000 level, Dinara Safina won both tournaments. Rome came out on top and it was a tougher race for the number one title. She had to come from a set down in three straight sets to beat Zheng Jie, Maria Jose Martinez Sanchez and Venus Williams before beating Svetlana Kuznetsova 6-3, 6-2 in the final. But in Madrid, Safina lost only one set, in the third round to Lucie Safarova.
Four years later, Serena Williams followed in Safina’s footsteps, this time in Madrid. The American suffered a rare 6-0 loss in the Madrid quarter-finals against Anabel Medina Garrigue, but eventually pulled through 6-3, 0-6, 7-5. However, he was dominant in Rome, conceding just 14 games in five matches.
Before Madrid became a WTA 1000 tournament in 2009, the Tier I event in Berlin took that spot on the calendar. Between 1982 and 2008, three players won Rome and Berlin consecutively: Stephanie Graf in 1987, Monica Seles in 1990 and Amelie Mauresmo in 2004.
It is too early for Sviatek to have a similar result on the radar.
“Winning the next match is on my radar,” he said. “As always, taking things in stride is the best way to go. There’s still a long way to go.”
Moreover, after Madrid and Roma expanded the draw to 96 players and became a fortnight last year, scoring the double is an even more difficult task. But historically, doing so at Roland Garros means success. Of the five women who won Rome and Madrid or Berlin in the same year, three won in Paris and took the Coupe Suzanne Lenglen: Graf, Seles and Williams. In 2009, Safina lost to Kuznetsova in the final. In 2004, Mauresmo’s campaign was ended by Elena Dementieva in the quarterfinals. Still, both of them were career-best Roland Garros for the pair.
What awaits Sviatek?
Former world number one Angelique Kerber awaits in the fourth round after defeating German Aliaksandra Sasnovich 6-3, 7-6(4). This week Kerber reached the last 16 of a WTA 1000 event for the second time since returning from maternity leave in January; He also did this scene in Indian Wells.
Sviatek wins 2-0 against Kerber. In 2022, he battled to a 4–6, 6–2, 6–3 fourth-round victory at Indian Wells as part of a historic 37-match winning streak that year. In January, she defeated Kerber 6-3, 6-0 in the United Cup final.
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