US Open defending champion and WTA #1 Iga Swiatek felt pleased after she made a quick work of Daria Saville in straight sets victory as planned but feels she has a lot to work on before her R3 clash.
Swiatek was not completely satisfied with her game despite winning in a comfortable fashion in just over 90 minutes. The Pole believes her plan to be aggressive worked out but rated her unforced error count as a negative.
“Well, I don’t know. I just felt like I kind of prevailed, because that match wasn’t easy,” Swiatek said in assessing her performance at a US Open press conference.
“I’m just happy to be in the third round. For sure I want to improve some stuff, because I did some unforced errors. You know, it’s just the beginning of the tournament, so for sure I work on some stuff.
“For sure I wanted to be intensive, and mostly I was in charge of what I’m going to kind of play, because I was the one that was attacking.
“I made some mistakes because you need to, you know, risk a little bit more. But, yeah, for sure, it wasn’t easy. She was using most of my power to get these balls back.
“So yeah, I’m just happy at the end I was the one that won.”
Swiatek also opened up about her struggles to control the emotional displays on court, saying that the worst emotion for a tennis player to be felt on court is shame. However, she gave herself a pat on the back by claiming that her overall management of both positive and negative emotions on court is not bad.
“I think, you know, the worst emotion you can feel in sport is shame when you play bad and you know that all these people are watching,” said the 22-year old.
“So this is something that I think, you know, this is the hardest thing. I felt that, you know, couple of times in my career. It wasn’t easy.
“For sure, you know, there are positive and negative emotions. Usually it’s harder to handle the negative ones. Yeah, it’s not easy. It’s part of the job to kind of just accept that you’re going to be watched and kind of not care about that.
“But on the other hand, work on being able to control your emotions and what you do on the court.
“I’m also working on that, and I made huge progress since couple of years ago.
“I don’t remember last time I broke a racket or, I don’t know, had, like, a burst of emotions, you know. Usually obviously there is something, because I am emotional and this is, like, a stressful job with a lot of tension and adrenaline.
“But still, I’m happy with how I’m managing that.”