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Swiatek, Raducanu, Bencic sweep into second round at US Open


No.7 seed Iga Swiatek of Poland got her 2021 US Open campaign off to a flying start, defeating American qualifier Jamie Loeb, 6-3, 6-4 in an hour and 14 minutes on the Grandstand court on Tuesday afternoon.

2020 Roland Garros champion Swiatek has now reached the second round in New York for the third straight season, and she is 10-1 overall in first-round matches at Grand Slam events.

Swiatek, though, is still seeking her first trip into the round of 16 at this particular major, with her third-round showing last year, when she lost to eventual runner-up Victoria Azarenka, as her career-best result.

As for World No.194 Loeb, the 26-year-old American did very well last week to become the only American woman to make it through qualifying this year. Loeb recently made the biggest final of her professional career, at the WTA 125 event in Charleston earlier this month.

This was only the second Grand Slam main-draw showing of Loeb’s career. She received a wildcard into the 2015 US Open main draw by virtue of winning the NCAA Division I singles title for the University of North Carolina.

Stat corner: The first meeting between the pair mostly favored the World No.8. Swiatek fired 23 winners to just 16 unforced errors, while the American’s 15 winners were well outpaced by 24 unforced errors.

Winning 17 out of 21 first-service points (81 percent), Swiatek was unbothered on serve, never facing a break point in the match. Swiatek broke serve two times out of nine break points to clinch victory.

Key moments: Swiatek stormed ahead to 5-2 in the opening set, but Loeb persevered on serve in that game, saving five set points to force Swiatek to serve for the set at 5-3. But the Pole was up to the challenge, holding serve at love to grab the one-set lead.

Swiatek used rocketing returns to collect the lone break of the second set, moving ahead 4-3. Loeb again avoided peril on her own serve, saving a match point before holding for 5-4, but Swiatek smoothly served out the match, ending the affair with two straight aces.

Thoughts from Iga: “It’s the first round so my level isn’t going to be as high as usual, but that’s normal,” Swiatek said, after the match. “I think I’m going to get into the rhythm in the next round. But I’m really happy with how I played this. My opponent played really well. When my shots didn’t have perfect precision, she used that and she played really fast.

“So it was kind of weird because I wasn’t in the rhythm, but I thought that I could let her sometimes make mistakes because I felt that she was risking a lot with her shots. At the end it worked out pretty well.”

Next up for SwiatekThe Polish star will face France’s Fiona Ferro in the second round, after Ferro beat Nao Hibino of Japan, 6-1, 6-4. In their only prior clash, Swiatek defeated Ferro in the third round of this year’s Australian Open.

Raducanu, Bencic notch straight-set wins

Rising British teen Emma Raducanu and Olympic champion Belinda Bencic also won their first-round encounters with relative ease at the 2021 US Open on Tuesday.

Raducanu, who successfully came through qualifying to make her US Open main-draw debut, dispatched lucky loser Stefanie Voegele of Switzerland, 6-2, 6-3 in an hour and 18 minutes.

Read more: Out of the spotlight, Raducanu engineers career surge in U.S.

Currently ranked at a career-high World No.150, 18-year-old Raducanu continues to impress after her breakthrough run to the round of 16 on home soil at Wimbledon, which was her first Grand Slam main-draw appearance.

World No.128 Voegele, who lost in the final round of qualies to top qualifying seed Ana Konjuh, clinched a spot in the main draw following the injury withdrawal of No.13 seed Jennifer Brady. But her run ended at the hands of the surging teen in the first meeting between the pair.

Raducanu nearly doubled Voegele’s winner count, by 24 to 13, and converted five of her eight break points. Three service breaks in Raducanu’s favor came in the latter stages of the first set, where she used pinpoint down-the-line hitting to storm back from an early break down.

Raducanu again came back from a break down in the second set, and the Brit took the lead for good by slamming a backhand winner on the baseline to break for 5-3. Although Raducanu had a bit of trouble closing, needing seven match points in the final game, she steeled herself to get through that tussle.

The young Brit will now attempt to get some revenge in the second round when she takes on Zhang Shuai of China, who beat American Hailey Baptiste, 6-3, 6-4. Zhang defeated Raducanu in the first round of San Jose mere weeks ago.

Meanwhile, a different Swiss player did ease into the second round, as Olympic gold medalist and No.11 seed Bencic claimed an opening-round win over Arantxa Rus of the Netherlands, 6-4, 6-4.

2019 US Open semifinalist Bencic came into the encounter having won her two previous meetings with Rus in straight sets, and this time around was no different as she moved past the World No.71 in 90 minutes.

Although left-handed Rus nearly matched Bencic in winners on the day (20 to 21) and both players had fewer unforced errors than winners, Bencic went unchallenged on serve, never facing a break point in the encounter. Bencic won 40 of her 48 service points in the match (83 percent).

“I felt very comfortable on the court,” Bencic told the press, after her win. “I felt like my serve was helping me a lot. In the last couple of matches I played a lot of times against left-handed players, so for sure it’s a little bit more tricky for me, especially against her today.

“I think her serve gave me a little bit of trouble, so I had to kind of find a way to break her. I’m just really happy with how I played and happy to be in the second round.”

Rus had entered the US Open on a hot streak, having won 14 of her last 15 matches: two straight ITF Challenger titles and, before those, a runner-up showing at the WTA 125 event in Belgrade. However, all of those wins came on clay, and Rus’s win-loss record at the US Open is now just 1-6 in her main-draw appearances.

Bencic will next face Italy’s Martina Trevisan, who notched a victory in the first US Open main-draw match of her career by ousting former US Open semifinalist CoCo Vandeweghe, 6-1, 7-5. Trevisan’s career-best performance at a major was her surprising run to the Roland Garros quarterfinals as a qualifier just last year.

Kvitova, Kontaveit roll 

No.10 seed Petra Kvitova of the Czech Republic also made short work of her first-round clash, dismissing Polona Hercog of Slovenia, 6-1, 6-2 in a hair over an hour on the Grandstand court.

Kvitova improved to 3-0 over Hercog; one of those earlier wins came in the opening round of the US Open nine years ago in 2012. Two-time Wimbledon champion Kvitova, whose best US Open results are quarterfinal runs in 2015 and 2017, converted all four of her break points in the match.

Kvitova and Hercog had an equal amount of unforced errors (13 apiece) but World No.86 Hercog fired only seven winners, to Kvitova’s 18. After breezing through the match, Kvitova will now face a fellow Czech, qualifier Kristyna Pliskova, in the second round.

“I think it was a pretty solid game from my side,” Kvitova said, after the match. “I played solid from the serve to return, from the baseline as well. I really enjoyed to play over there. I played Polona a few times. It’s been always a big battle, so I expected a tough challenge.

“From the beginning, I think I was really there. The first two games was kind of key to get a little bit more relaxed and comfortable in the court.”

Also on Tuesday evening, last week’s Cleveland champion Anett Kontaveit of Estonia defeated 2011 US Open champion Samantha Stosur, 6-3, 6-0, in an hour and 11 minutes.

No.28 seed Kontaveit saved the only two break points she faced as she eased past the former World No.4 from Australia. Kontaveit had 19 winners to 11 unforced errors in the tilt, while Stosur’s 17 winners were outpaced by 28 unforced errors.





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