Usually five-time Grand Slam title winners don’t think that the reward for winning a Wimbledon first round is playing another match on grass. But most five-time Grand Slam title winners are not Iga Swiatek.
Swiatek got through a banana peel of an opener on Tuesday, beating another Grand Slam title winner and a familiar foe, Sofia Kenin. Swiatek actually won her first of five against Kenin, beating the American in straight sets at the 2020 French Open.
Since then, their careers have gone in opposite directions — which is why Kenin was facing the No. 1 seed in the first round — but the American knocked out compatriot Coco Gauff at this stage last year.
No such issues for Swiatek, who notched a fairly efficient 6-3, 6-4 win.
It wasn’t perfect, but it did the job, especially considering it was Swiatek’s first match since the French Open final. She played no warm-up tournaments ahead of Wimbledon — a debatable move — but she needed the rest more than the practice, especially since she is headed back to clay later this summer, to try and win the gold medal at the Paris Olympics.
“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 the practice court — I feel like I’m making progress every year, and every year is a little bit faster for me — in terms of the process of adapting to the surface. 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.”
Swiatek now gets Petra Martic of Croatia in the second round. Hopefully it’s an easier task than the second round of the French Open, where she faced Naomi Osaka and saved a match point before winning by a hair in the third set.
