Iga Swiatek’s return to the circuit from injury began on a triumphant note at the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix. The world no. 1 defeated Qinwen Zheng in their opening-round clash 6-1, 6-4 to take her place in the quarter-finals.
This was the third time Swiatek and Zheng were taking on each other and it was also the easiest win that Swiatek had had against her Chinese opponent. On both past two occasions, she’d needed the deciding set to come through.
In Stuttgart on Thursday, Swiatek needed only 86 minutes to notch the win. Swiatek was broken once in the match, in the second set. She, however, converted four of eight break points that came her way. For the match, the reigning champion in the tournament won 62 points, 20 more than her opponent.
Post-match, Swiatek said, “I felt like I needed to be 100% focused from the beginning to the end, to think about technique and tactics. I’m pretty happy that I’m not rusty and I could perform good tennis, even though I had a break”.
For a place in the semi-finals, Swiatek will now play Karolina Pliskova. Pliskova won the first match of the day against Croatian Donna Vekic, 6-2, 6-7(5), 7-6(5) after almost two-and-a-half-hours.
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