By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Saturday June 25, 2022
She’s been practicing on grass for ten days this summer, and hasn’t played a single match, but Iga Swiatek has a wealth of experience she can draw on at Wimbledon this year, regardless of her relative inexperience on the surface.
The World No.1 told reporters on Saturday at Wimbledon that she’s feeling confident in her preparations and, most important, she has had time to decompress after a mentally and physically grueling run on the clay that saw her claim her second Roland-Garros title on June 4.
“This year I only played, like, 10 days on grass, so it's not a lot,” Swiatek said. “I didn't have a lot of time to prepare. But I'm just trying to stay open-minded and kind of take positives from the situation and realize that I can play without any expectations.”
The Pole rides into her third Wimbledon main draw appearance riding a 35-match winning streak – a decidedly different scenario from last year when she was ninth in the world and a clear understudy to then world No.1 Ash Barty.
52 weeks later, Barty is gone from the sport and Swiatek is the dominant force in women’s tennis. She’s been so dominant that she’s the heavy favorite to win her first Wimbledon title despite never having progressed past the round of 16 at SW19.
Swiatek is one of just eight WTA players that have held a winning streak of 35 or more matches – if she wins her first two rounds at Wimbledon she will be in possession of the longest streak on the WTA Tour since at least 1990.
If there’s pressure that comes with that, Swiatek says she’s not feeling it. The 21-year-old is ready to put the blinders on and simply set about the task of improving her grass-court tennis. If she does that, she knows things will be alright.
“I have [had] so much [success] this season that I don't have to kind of show everybody that I need to play well on every tournament because it's tennis, we have ups and downs,” she said. “So I try to play without expectations and just see what this tournament brings me.”
Swiatek, who will play on Centre Court against Jana Fett of Croatia on Tuesday at Wimbledon, feels strongly that the decision not to play a warm up event on grass was the right one for her.
“I needed time to rest after such an intense beginning of the season,” she said. “Keeping up with that streak, playing tournaments week by week, it wasn't easy. So that was just the best decision for me to stay in a good shape.”
Before we discount Swiatek as a grass averse player, one must consider the fact that she won the girls singles title at Wimbledon in 2018. Clearly she can excel on the surface.
Swiatek was asked about her junior days by a reporter on Saturday, and marvelled at the progress she has made in the last four years.
“I think everything changed and I am pretty happy that I made such a progress,” she said. “Still four years, it's not like a lot of time. But that was probably the most important time in my career in terms of, like, developing and finding my game and learning how to do new stuff on court.
“I watched some highlights that popped up on Instagram, it looked like slow-motion tennis, honestly. I'm pretty happy that right now I'm on different level and I could do that transition well. Yeah, it seems like a different world honestly.”
Winning streak not an issue - winning on grass is
Entering Wimbledon on a 35-match winning streak makes for a unique situation, but Swiatek says she is more focussed on figuring out how to be at her best on grass than how to keep her streak alive.
“I think time off has nothing to do with it,” she said, when asked if it still feels like she is on a winning streak even though she hasn’t played since early June. “It's more like being on grass and kind of not knowing what's going to happen for me. This is one reason why I feel like I don't want to focus on the streak, like winning more matches. I just want to realize what's going on on grass, how to play the best kind of tennis on it.”