Iga Swiatek feels she has been a forced to reckon with on the WTA tour since 2020 but admits she still needs work to do to maintain her success.
Swiatek kicked off her Stuttgart campaign with a straight sets 6-3, 6-4 win against Elise Mertens on Thursday. The WTA No. 1 enters the clay tourney having already sealed two titles this season at the WTA events in Indian Wells and Doha and leads the WTA year-end finals race to Riyadh.
The Pole is also tipped to become only the 9th man in history to reach 100 weeks as world No. 1 when rankings are updated on Monday, having reached the #1 position over two years ago.
Swiatek ever since clinching her first tour title at the French Open in 2020 has displayed her dominance in the women’s game with 19 titles and 4 majors.
After her victory against the Belgian, the 22-year-old was asked if she was ready to become the dominant player on the women’s side of tour, Swiatek replied by saying that she feels she has already proven herself as a dominant force.
“Well, the question is if I already did that for the past two years,” said Swiatek, in her post-match press conference.
“Because I feel like I have been pretty dominant, and also Aryna [Sabalenka] has been, so we both kind of have shown that there is consistency on WTA.
“I remember when I was playing in 2020, 2021, I also got many questions about consistency, and I felt like some players, you know, have proven that it’s possible. So I already feel like I have been pretty dominant.
“But we’ll see what next years are going to bring. There have been players that have been dominating throughout their whole careers, you know, and I’m still at the beginning.
“There is still so much work to do.”
Though Stuttgart is only a WTA 500 event, the 4-time Grand Slam champion admitted that she still faced pressure at the tourney this week. A two time defending champion at the tournament, a victory this year would see her become the first player to win the tourney three times in a row since Maria Sharapova in 2014.
Swiatek has already achieved such a feat this year as her 2024 Doha title was a ‘threepeat’. The clay-court specialist admitted that he does feel extra pressure to claim the title this year.
Swiatek added: “Well, there is always pressure behind me somewhere. You can’t avoid that on this level and when you’re a favorite in every match – so I’m not really thinking about that.
“It’s tricky to win three times. I remember how I felt in Doha at the beginning of the tournament. Things were kind of following me, and it was hard to let it go.
“Here I just try to focus on the game, and I remember playing really some tricky matches during the past two years. It’s never an easy tournament, so I don’t expect it.
“I’m not taking it for granted or anything. I know that anything can happen in tennis, and if I lose, it’s going to obviously be a huge surprise, but it’s normal.
“I’ll try to focus on each match at a time and not think about winning because it’s still a long way.”