Iga Swiatek defeats Elina Svitolina in straight sets in saturday doubleheader

Iga Swiatek swung big with the forehand to beat down Elina Svitolina at the BNL Internazionali d'italia Saturday

Iga Swiatek proved her comfort on the clay courts once more that she couldn’t be stopped at the BNL Internazionali D’Italia Saturday. After a delay of her quarterfinal match with Elina Svitolina, the Pole came through with good court placement and a lot of defense to advance into the semifinals with a 6-2, 7-5 win on Pietrangeli Court at the Foro Italico in Rome. 

The two top 15 stars met for the first time in a pivotal point of the tournament where both had the quality of playing on the clay court but not against one another. Both dropped a set on their way to the last eight, but a pass early for the Pole against Alison Riske left her with energy to take on the Ukrainian. Svitolina’s game hasn’t come close to the times where she won the title in Rome, but her tactics tend to come out when necessary. 

The 26-year-old found herself in a hold early as the Pole scored a serve to love to open the match with.  Svitolina took her chance to even the score, but the 19-year-old easily broke her, then went on to consolidate in the third for a commanding lead. Svitolina worked hard to serve in the fourth to hold back Swiatek and get on the board. The 15^th seed battled hard on serve in the fifth, holding off Svitolina’s threat to deuce and a breakpoint before holding it. 

The Ukrainian knew that she had to keep the margin small to come back, but a double fault came at the wrong time. The fifth seed managed to avoid losing the sixth, but she left the door open in the short term. After Swiatek won the seventh by a swift pace, she added further pressure on Svitolina to commit a second double fault to end the set in 36 minutes for the Pole’s set advantage in the match. Winners were the difference maker between the two players, who served near 50 percent but one having a stronger output of confidence. 

The second saw them hold serve with the Ukrainian digging in to make sure she stayed with Swiatek at all cost. The 26-year-old scored a huge break in the third, but it was short-lived as Swiatek struck back to break back in the fourth to level the score. The Pole was on her way to holding serve in the fifth, but a double fault turned her 40-0 grip to fighting for the game on deuce. After a couple of breaks, she managed to hold and followed it up with a break of the Ukrainian. 

Svitolina dug into the clay and came back to break back and leveled things at four-all with a supreme hold that gave her a lot of power. The Pole battled anger and frustrations on serve in the ninth, focusing them into her offense that produced a much-needed hold to play for the match in the hopes that she could break Svitolina. The fifth seed served well, drawing an error from Swiatek before getting the score tied at five-all on a second error. 

Swiatek was first to act adding aggression to her offense that gave her to the penultimate 11^th game. Svitolina felt the pressure and erred just enough to bring up two match points for the 15^th seed. In the final rally, it came down the smallest margin of a return for Svitolina that landed wide of the tramlines giving Swiatek the victory after 1 hour and 36 minutes. 

While she managed to keep the match short against a difficult opponent, Swiatek would have very little time to recover before her semifinal match with Cori Gauff later in the day.