The third-round matchup of major champions at the Australian Open wound up as a major mismatch.
Second-seeded Iga Swiatek of Poland trounced Great Britain’s Emma Raducanu 6-1, 6-0 on Saturday to advance to the Round of 32.
Swiatek held serve to open the match, and Raducanu did so in the next game. Raducanu never won another game, and she never managed a break point on Swiatek’s serve in the match.
“I wouldn’t say I’m ruthless,” said Swiatek, a four-time French Open champion and the 2022 U.S. Open winner. “I just try to have the same kind of attitude and same kind of focus no matter what the score is.
“But it’s not like I want to, you know, show something. I’m just playing my game. If it’s working, why stop? I’ve also seen many matches when someone was back being down like 2-5 or something. You always have to just keep going. It’s not over till it’s over.”
Swiatek, who finished with a 24-9 edge in winners, said of her level of play, “For sure I felt great. I felt like the ball is listening to me. So just pretty loosened up. At the end I felt like all the tactics and everything I wanted to do, I was able to. So I just kept going.”
Raducanu, who won the U.S. Open in 2021, said of the defeat, “The scoreline was obviously quite harsh. I feel like I look back and know exactly what I need to do, and I take it as feedback. I’m very clear on what happened out there.
“The scoreline reflects one thing: If I’m not necessarily able to hold my service games or dictate, it seeps into the rest of my game.”
Elsewhere in the third round, No. 6 Elena Rybakina of Kazakhstan downed No. 32 Dayana Yastremska of Ukraine 6-3, 6-4; No. 8 Emma Navarro of the United States emerged with a 6-4, 3-6, 6-4 victory over Tunisia’s Ons Jabeur; No. 9 Daria Kasatkina of Russia topped Kazakhstan’s Yulia Putintseva, the 24 seed, 7-5, 6-1; and Germany’s Eva Lys rallied past Romania’s Jaqueline Cristian 4-6, 6-3, 6-3.
–Field Level Media
