Iga Swiatek’s No. 1 ranking, four Grand Slam titles and 18-match winning streak were no help against big-hitting teen Linda Noskova at the Australian Open. After crouching at the baseline and covering her face when she closed out the 3-6, 6-3, 6-4 third-round victory over Swiatek on Saturday, the 50th-ranked Noskova said: “I didn't really think that it would end up like this.” Noskova, after all, is making her debut at the year's first Grand Slam tournament and had only two match wins at all majors until a week ago.
Top-ranked Iga Swiatek rallied from 4-1 down in the third set to escape with a narrow 6-4, 3-6, 6-4 win over 2022 runner-up Collins on Thursday and advance to the third round of the Australian Open. In a mometum-swinging match, Swiatek was on top after recovering an early break and leading by a set and a break before the American player rallied to take the second set and race to a 4-1 lead with two service breaks in the third. Swiatek absorbed the sustained pressure from Collins’ powerful groundstrokes until she reversed the momentum on a match-winning five-game roll.
With her own kind of perpetual motion, Danielle Collins transitioned swiftly from an Australian Open loss to the world's top-ranked player to announcing this would be her last season on the professional tennis tour. While Iga Swiatek was still doing an post-match, on-court TV interview, the 30-year-old American entered a small interview room. The 2022 Australian Open runner-up had just lost five straight games to surrender a 4-1 third-set lead against Swiatek, eventually going down 6-4, 3-6, 6-4 in a 3-hour, 14-minute match on Rod Laver Arena.
Top-ranked Iga Swiatek survived an early test of her Australian Open title hopes when she beat former champion Sofia Kenin 7-6 (2), 6-2 in the first round on Tuesday. Kenin, the winner in 2020, served for the first set at 5-4 but could not close it out and Swiatek took it in the tiebreaker. The No. 1 seed then broke Kenin in the fifth game of the second set and held on to clinch victory.
Top-ranked Iga Swiatek gave her Poland team an early lead in its United Cup final against Germany with a straight sets win against Angelique Kerber on Sunday. Thre 22-year-old Swiatek beat Kerber 6-3, 6-0 in 70 minutes to stretch her win-streak to 16 matches, after the four-time major winner finished a successful 2023 with title wins at the China Open and the WTA Finals in Mexico. Poland needs just one more win from the remaining mens singles or mixed doubles match to claim their first United Cup.