SWIATEK’S 37-MATCH STREAK ENDS
WIMBLEDON, England—topranked Iga Swiatek was unbeaten since February and sure seemed unbeatable, compiling 37 consecutive match wins and six consecutive tournament titles.
She’s never quite been as comfortable on grass courts as other surfaces, though, and a mistakefilled Saturday sent Swiatek out of Wimbledon in the third round with a 6-4, 6-2 loss to 37th-ranked Alize Cornet of France.
“I know I didn’t play good tennis. I was pretty confused about my tactics,” said Swiatek, a two-time French Open champion who has never advanced past the fourth round at the All England Club. “For sure, it wasn’t a good performance for me.”
It was not just the match’s winner that was unexpected. It was also just how one-sided this one-hour and 33-minute encounter was.
“This kind of match is what I’m living for, it’s what I’m practicing for every day,” Cornet said. “It really drives me. I knew I could do it. Somehow, I had this belief.”
No woman had won as many matches in a row as Swiatek since Martina Hingis also put together a run of 37 in 1997.
But right away, it seemed, this would not be Swiatek’s day.
“I didn’t know what to do,” she said. Neither, several hours later, did fourth-seeded Stefanos Tsitsipas, who grew frustrated by what he called a “circus” atmosphere and “bullying” tactics by Nick Kyrgios, who cursed and argued his way to a 6-7 (2), 6-4, 6-3, 7-6 (7) victory.
Kyrgios repeatedly berated chair umpire Damien Dumusois and insisted that Tsitsipas should be defaulted for hitting a ball into the stands near fans after dropping the second set at No. 1 Court.
There was some simultaneous contentiousness across the way at Centre Court, too, although to a much lesser degree, as 22-time major champion Rafael Nadal beat No. 27 seed Lorenzo Sonego, 6-1, 6-2, 6-4. Nadal objected to Sonego’s elongated grunts and called him up to the net to discuss it—sonego objected to that sort of face-to-face confrontation.
Afterward, Nadal apologized, saying he shouldn’t have tried to engage his opponent that way.
On a chilly, windy afternoon at No. 1 Court, Swiatek quickly fell behind 3-0 and of Cornet’s first 14 points, nine came via unforced errors off the racket of the 21-year-old player from Poland. Only one came via a winner produced by Cornet herself.
Normally so crisp with her shots, calm with her demeanor, Swiatek was not exactly at ease in either sense. After one missed forehand return, she swatted the toes of her right shoe with her racket.