LONDON — After placing one shot into the online, Iga Swiatek muttered to herself. After one other level went awry, she positioned her hand over her mouth. Usually, she seemed as flustered as she ever does on a tennis courtroom.
As soon as once more, she went from unbeatable on the French Open’s purple clay to underwhelming on Wimbledon’s inexperienced grass.
The No. 1-ranked Swiatek’s 21-match successful streak ended with a listless efficiency and a slew of errors on Saturday, including as much as a 3-6, 6-1, 6-2 loss to unseeded Yulia Putintseva within the third spherical on the All England Membership.
“Going from this sort of tennis, the place I felt like I am taking part in the perfect tennis in my life, to a different floor, the place I form of wrestle a little bit bit extra, it is not simple,” mentioned Swiatek, who solely as soon as has made it so far as the quarterfinals at Wimbledon, exiting at that stage a yr in the past. “All that stuff actually combines to me not likely having a superb time in Wimbledon.”
By no means does. In 2022, for instance, her 37-match unbeaten run was stopped with one other third-round loss on the All England Membership, that one to Alize Cornet.
Swiatek, a 23-year-old from Poland, is a five-time Grand Slam champion, together with 4 titles at Roland Garros — most not too long ago final month — and one on the exhausting courts on the U.S. Open. She has talked about trying ahead to bettering on grass, however she determined to withdraw final month from the one tuneup occasion that was initially on her schedule earlier than Wimbledon.
Not that Swiatek thinks that was the problem in opposition to the Thirty fifth-ranked Putintseva.
Quite the opposite, Swiatek described herself as not giving herself sufficient of an opportunity to relaxation after the French Open.
“My tank of actually pushing myself to the boundaries grew to become, abruptly, empty,” she mentioned. “I used to be form of stunned.”
After a ho-hum first set, Swiatek light in opposition to Putintseva, making mistake after mistake.
Swiatek not solely received all 4 earlier conferences in opposition to Putintseva, but additionally claimed each set that they had performed. Requested throughout a postmatch interview on No. 1 Court docket how she managed to emerge with the victory, the often-animated Putintseva replied: “I do not know. Actually, I do not.”
Effectively, right here is not less than one key a part of what occurred: Swiatek seemed little or no like somebody who has led the WTA rankings for almost each week since April 2022 and is assured of remaining there it doesn’t matter what occurs the remainder of the best way at Wimbledon.
Nonetheless, this was her characterization of this week: “I felt like I underachieved a little bit bit. However it’s tennis, so you need to transfer on. I am going to have many extra probabilities this yr to indicate my recreation. I am going to simply give attention to that.”
Putintseva is on an eight-match run of her personal, all on grass, together with a title at Birmingham earlier than arriving in London. That is the primary time in 10 appearances at Wimbledon that the 29-year-old from Kazakhstan made it previous the second spherical.
Her greatest displaying at any Slam was attending to the quarterfinals on the French Open twice and U.S. Open as soon as.
“I used to be taking part in fearless. I used to be simply: ‘I can do it. I’ve to consider 100%. I’ve nothing to lose. Simply go for it,'” Putintseva mentioned at her information convention. “Additionally, my coach informed me, ‘Irrespective of which shot you are doing, consider 100%.'”
When she was constructing a 4-0 lead within the final set by grabbing 16 of its first 19 factors, Putintseva solely wanted to supply two winners. Her different 14 factors in that span have been gained because of both unforced errors (seven) or compelled errors (seven) off Swiatek’s racket.
By the top, Swiatek had amassed 38 unforced errors, greater than twice as many as her opponent’s 15.
Subsequent up for Putintseva is a matchup in opposition to 2017 French Open champion Jelena Ostapenko, who’s seeded thirteenth. Additionally transferring into the fourth spherical have been 2022 Wimbledon champ Elena Rybakina, 2021 French Open winner Barbora Krejcikova, No. 17 Anna Kalinskaya, No. 21 Elina Svitolina and unseeded Wang Xinyu.
Svitolina superior with a 6-1, 7-6 (4) victory over No. 10 Ons Jabeur, a three-time Grand Slam runner-up, together with at Wimbledon every of the previous two years.
The Related Press contributed to this story.