Iga Swiatek’s season has been defined by expectations. The expectation that she should live up to the extraordinary standards she set last year, when she won eight titles, including two grand slams, and compiled the longest winning streak for a quarter of a century. The expectations that go with the No 1 ranking. The expectation that she would continue to set the pace on the WTA Tour and embellish her status as the pre-eminent player of her generation.
Unsurprisingly, the pressure of those various assumptions soon became suffocating. Within three months, Swiatek was speaking of the difficulty of competing with “a target on my back”. At that stage, she had won all but three of her 17 matches, defending her Qatar Open title and reaching the final in Dubai. Yet the critical gaze intensified. “Defence” – of titles, status, points – became the articulate Pole’s least favourite English word. Small wonder, then, that after finally losing her season-long struggle to prevent Aryna Sabalenka from wresting the No 1 ranking from her grasp at the US Open, Swiatek arrived in Beijing for the China Open expressing relief at having “some baggage off my shoulders”.
Coco Gauff felt the full force of that newfound sense of liberation on Saturday as Swiatek, swinging freely and fearlessly, sealed a 6-3, 6-2 victory to break the US Open champion’s 16-match unbeaten run and advance to her third WTA 1000 final of the season. It felt like a resumption of normal service for Swiatek, who recorded her eighth straight-sets win in nine matches against Gauff after losing to the American teenager for the first time in her career two months ago in Cincinnati.
“I’m really happy with my performance,” said Swiatek in her on-court interview. “It feels like I can play freely again. It’s been a while since I felt that way, so I’ll remember for the rest of my career that even though tougher times may come, in your mind you can always overcome that, with hard work you can achieve it.
“I’m happy that I switched my attitude after the US Open. Hopefully I’m going to be able to keep it for as long as possible.”
Swiatek is a naturally methodical character, yet here she was quick to cast off the shackles, nailing her returns, serving with bite and precision, and combining length, accuracy and consistency with destructive power off the ground. It was a masterclass in instinctive but controlled aggression, one laced with an emotional intensity that spoke volumes about the Pole’s determination to claim a statement victory.
Swiatek’s spirited display was mirrored by her team. Accused of a lack of engagement by certain sections of her fanbase during a quarter-final loss to Veronika Kudermetova last week in Tokyo, Team Swiatek formed an animated collective here, mirroring their employer’s celebratory fist-pump as she sealed the first set. No one was more ardent than Daria Abramowicz, Swiatek’s psychologist, who rose to her feet with a roar, both fists clenched, after copping social media flak for perusing her phone during Swiatek’s defeat in Tokyo.
Obliged to fend off two break points in the opening game, Gauff immediately found herself on the back foot. A pair of brilliant backhand winners propelled Swiatek to a break in the American’s next service game, and from there the world No 2 drove home her advantage with an emphatic serving display. Swiatek did not face a single break point throughout the contest, dropping just eight points on her delivery.
“I am practising a lot my first serve,” said Swiatek, who has strengthened her game in several key areas in the weeks since Jelena Ostapenko ended her reign as US Open champion.
“For sure, [at] this tournament, it’s working. I don’t know exactly why. I feel like overall, I’m more loosened up. I feel more free. Everything is a little bit easier than in [the] past tournament.”
Swiatek sustained her unfettered play into the second set, which began with another break of serve courtesy of a loose forehand from Gauff. Up against the game’s finest front-runner and hampered by a shoulder injury that required a medical timeout, there was to be no way back for the third seed. Swiatek has lost only once this season after taking the opening set, and Gauff had no answer to the relentless consistency of an opponent whose 17 winners were offset by a meagre six unforced errors. It was a sobering conclusion to what has been a career-defining run by Gauff.
“One of the goals that I set earlier in the year was to do well in the big events, do better on the 1000 level,” said the 19-year-old, whose triumph at Flushing Meadows was prefaced by a first WTA 1000 title win in Cincinnati. “I accomplished that goal.
“Hopefully, next year I can continue this consistency. Maybe not 16 in a row on a consistent level but, as long as I can string along some wins, 1000 title wins, and hopefully a grand slam, [that] would be a great goal for me.”
For Swiatek, meanwhile, the target now is a fifth trophy of the season to sit alongside the silverware she has gathered in Qatar, Stuttgart, Paris and Warsaw this year. To collect it, she will need to see off Liudmila Samsonova, the Russian world No 22, who maintained her unblemished record against Elena Rybakina, the Kazakh fifth seed and former Wimbledon champion, with a 7-6 (9-7), 6-3 victory.
Swiatek, unbeaten in two previous meetings with Samsonova, dropped just one game when they played earlier this year in Dubai. Thoughts of the past will be far from her mind, however.
“I’m trying not to overanalyse or overthink,” said Swiatek. “I’m trying to do the work mentally like on every tournament. Maybe not being No 1 helps a little bit with that.
“It’s just easier. You can keep your focus better and longer. You don’t have any thoughts that are kind of messing with your head. Sometimes it’s even easier to run, or easier to do something technically, because it goes more naturally.”
Finally unburdened by expectation, Swiatek will be eager to continue in that free-flowing vein.