Iga Swiatek says she doesn’t consider her run at this year’s US Open as a ‘total failure’ despite losing her No.1 ranking.
The 22-year-old dropped only nine games in her first three matches played at Flushing Meadows before crashing out in the fourth round to Jelena Ostapenko. Swiatek won the opening set against the Latvian before losing 12 out of the next 15 games played. It was the second time Swiatek has lost in the fourth round of a major event this season after the Australian Open.
Reflecting on that defeat, the Pole is maintaining an upbeat mentality despite the consequences it has had. Her reign at world No.1 has come to an end with Aryna Sabalenka now leading the rankings. She won the US Open title in 2022.
“It wasn’t the first time I lost in the fourth round. I don’t consider it a total failure, as many people say,” she told Eurosport. “I know a tournament like this can happen. Even last year I was very close to being eliminated in the fourth round. Sometimes you can get out of a situation like that, sometimes you can’t.”
Swiatek admits she doesn’t enjoy paying against former French Open champion Ostapenko, who she has lost to in all four of their Tour meetings. So far this season, Ostapenko has beaten three top 10 players with the other two being Daria Kasatkina and Coco Gauff.
“I don’t like playing with Ostapenko,” she stated. “There are simply some players who are uncomfortable to play with. I bet she has the opposite situation and she especially likes my style. This is completely natural in tennis.’
“There is no point in falling into a catastrophe, we have to move forward,” she added.
Besides her US Open disappointment, Swiatek has won four titles this year – one WTA 250, two WTA 500’s and a Grand Slam (French Open). The only other player to have won this amount of titles on the women’s Tour is Gauff. Overall, she has won 56 matches.
Looking ahead to the future, Swiatek has hinted that she might revise her Tour calendar to give her more time to train between tournaments. Suggesting that she might have been able to develop more as an athlete if she didn’t have the No.1 spot.
“The truth is that there was little time to train. This is the second season in which I have played the most games among all the girls and I suffered two injuries. (…) I think that, if I were not the leader of the world ranking, I would have much more time to develop as an athlete,” she commented.
“Next season we will definitely think about the calendar. I’m the type of player who needs a full week or two to improve my technique. Because it can always happen that the technique fails, you start to panic and think in your head what to do to play better.”
Swiatek is set to return to competitive tennis next week at the Toray Pan Pacific Open in Japan.
