Iga Swiatek Triumph Over Mirra Andreeva to Secure Cincinnati Open 2024 Semifinal Spot
World No. 1 Iga Swiatek showed her championship mettle by mounting an incredible comeback against teenage phenom Mirra Andreeva at the Cincinnati Open 2024.
She overcame a one-set deficit to win 4-6, 6-3, 7-5. With this victory, Swiatek advances to the renowned tournament’s semifinals for the second year running. The 17-year-old superstar was defeated by the world No. 1 after falling behind, securing their spot in the Queen City semifinals for the second consecutive year.
Reaching the semifinals at the Lindner Family Tennis Center for the second consecutive season, the world No. 1 is making the most of her first hard-court competition in almost six months. She won in two hours and thirty minutes on Center Court.
Swiatek was eager to lower expectations before her first hard-court competition since the Miami Open in March, even though she had just won her first Olympic medal and finished third on the podium behind Zheng Qinwen and Donna Vekic.
Earlier in the week, she declared during her Media Day press conference, “I’m going to treat it as a practice tournament.” “Not that I don’t care, but rather that I want to put all of the stuff I’ve practiced into practice, and I believe that’s the best course of action for me.”
Swiatek, who has won the 2022 US Open, has flourished in similar circumstances when using the lighter Regular Duty tennis balls on fast hard courts. She appeared to be settling into her game following a setback in her opening round match against Varvara Gracheva. She booked her first encounter with Andreeva with a relatively straightforward victory over Marta Kostyuk in straight sets in her second match.
Andreeva, who was only 17 years old, was participating in her maiden Cincinnati Open after winning a silver medal in the women’s doubles competition at the Summer Olympics with Diana Shnaider. Ever since making it to the second round of Wimbledon last summer, Andreeva has been a player to watch. She has continued to improve since bringing in coach Conchita Martinez in the spring. By June, she had achieved her greatest career victory when she defeated world No. 2 Aryna Sabalenka on her way to the Roland Garros quarterfinals.
Andreeva triumphed in her maiden WTA tournament at the Iași Open in Romania, and she returned to concrete courts with ease. The youthful unknown defeated former world No. 1 Karolina Pliskova and No. 5 seed Jasmine Paolini, coming back from a set down to win the latter to advance to her second WTA 1000 quarterfinal, after storming through her first round match against No. 11 seed Emma Navarro.
Andreeva faced Swiatek for the first time and showed no fear at all, breaking the Pole and holding on to seal the opening set with an ace. Andreeva was hoping to become the youngest player to defeat a world No. 1 since 2021 (Coco Gauff d. Ashleigh Barty, Rome).
In the second set, Swiatek made a quick recovery, jumping out to a 3-0 lead and won ten straight games on the serve to tie the match at one set apiece.
From then on, the final set was tense from the start, with Andreeva serving first and leading through nine games. Swiatek served to stay in the match as it headed toward what appeared to be an inevitable final-set tiebreaker against Andreeva, who finished the day with a total of 12 aces.
As Swiatek earned the first break point of the set in the tenth game, Andreeva lost her cool and threw her racket. With an ace saved, Andreeva gave the world No. 1 the opportunity to serve for the match, but she erred badly off the backhand.
Swiatek saved a break point and earned match point with an unreturnable serve as he was about to win. Swiatek crossed the finish line with a final, lengthy rally, ahead of either No. 10 seed Liudmila Samsonova or No. 3 seed Aryna Sabalenka.
