Wimbledon, England — Iga Sweet may not love grass, but she has shown fighting and bullish determination as she tasted the fight to the surface and beat American Catty McNally 5-7, 6-2, 6-1 and recovered to reach Wimbledon’s third round on Thursday.
World No. 208 McNally looked poised to cause upset when he took away his way back from 4-1 to win his first set with the five-time Grand Slam champions.
At that point, Sweet’s mediocre record at the All England club, which Paul never passed the quarterfinals, appeared to be weighing heavily on her shoulders.
But rather than moving away from scrapping, the former world No. 1 appeared to flick the psychological switch where she came out for the second set, increasing her aggression and not being able to play with McNally.
She broke early in the second set, never looking back, and lost three more games to set up Daniel Collins’ clash with another American.
“I started the game well and I knew my game was there,” Swiatek said. “I knew at the start of the second set it had to be more accurate. I tried to improve it, but I’m happy it worked.”
The eighth seed may set her vision much higher than in the third round, but reaching the final 32 she emphasized consistency on the big stage.
The 23-year-old is the third player of the century to reach the third round in 22 consecutive women’s singles grand slams after Amelie Mauresmo and Serena Williams.
Also on Thursday, defending champion Barbora Krezikova was taken to three sets before Caroline d’Orhid 6-4, 3-6, 6-2 and 2022 Wimbledon winner Elena Raibakina defeated Maria Saccari 6-3, 6-1.
No. 7 seed Mirra Andreeva and No. 10 Emma Navarro both went straight sets. The 18-year-old Andreva won a 6-1, 7-6 (4) victory over Italy’s Lucia Bronzetti, with Navarro cruised Veronica Cudermetova 6-1, 6-2.
Meanwhile, Zeynep Sonmez became the first Turkish player in his professional days, defeating Xinyu Wang 7-5, 7-5 to reach the third round of the Grand Slam tournament.
Her name has four French open titles, the other in the US, with Swiatek’s apparent Wimbledon Records, appearing in two semi-finals in Australia, stands out like a thumbs up.
While her run to the Bad Homburg Final at the Grass Court warm-up event showed that her game wasn’t entirely inappropriate on the surface, in her first set with McNally, you might have thought that this tournament wasn’t just for her.
After breaking early and taking a 4-1 lead, the wheels temporarily escaped as McNally did everything to get Swiatek out of her comfort zone.
The Americans received serves towards the baseline and worked for a while, trying to lessen the time to respond to the return to swiatek.
McNally drove four breakpoints in his seventh match before finally seizing a chance on his fifth attempt before taking a 6-5 lead when Sweet swiped the length of his backhand.
Everything seemed to be on the American path when Paul fired a wild forehand from the target and handed the opener to McNally. But that was as good as it got.
Swiatek is well aware of McNally’s game – the pair were a young doubles partner, winning a junior title at Roland Garros in 2018, and ending up being demolished in double time.
She took a 2-0 lead in the second set, and once again leveled the contest with one set each.
Swiatek then did the same at the start of the third set, moving 2-0 and 2-0 on a swiped crosscoat in the forehand.
It was easy for Paul then, but he had to save five breakpoints before closing the victory with an ace.
As well as gaining her spot in the next round, the match with her old performance partner provided an incredible trip through Memory Lane.
“It’s pretty funny because I remember these games pretty well,” she said of Junior Days.
“We know each other well… She’s one of those people who not only are you a rival on tour, but also make you feel like you respect each other and like each other.”
Reuters and the Associated Press contributed to the report.
