Having been one of the most dominant players on clay over the past few years, Iga Swiatek was touted to be a top contender for the French Open title. However, this campaign turned out to follow the same pattern of early exits for the World No. 3, who hasn’t been able to win a singles crown so far this season. The shock result even left former American ATP star Andy Roddick concerned about Swiatek’s current form.

“Props to Kostyuk, but it’s concerning for Iga, right? When she’s rolling people, it looks good,” he said on the latest episode of the Served Podcast. “When it gets into the kind of nitty-gritty right now… I think she is making more errors than she wants to. Maybe going between styles, ‘Do I go super aggressive or do I try to pull back a little bit?’ It feels like maybe she is searching for something in those moments.”

This was just the fourth time that Swiatek had come out on the losing side at the French Open. It was also her earliest exit from the tournament since the 2019 edition, where she had again been eliminated in the fourth round by Simona Halep. Though clay is her preferred surface, this is the second consecutive season where she has failed to clinch any titles in the swing.

“Wimbledon was a little different because she snuck out one long match early on, but then she was just rolling people. So, it seems to be when the matches are a little bit closer, she is questioning herself a little bit, which is different because for so long she was…robotic. Obviously, there’s nerves in there, but it’s just weird to see her kind of fate, especially at this tournament when the chips are down. But Kostyuk is fantastic,” he added.

The four-time French Open champion was the favorite coming into the match against Kostyuk as she led the head-to-head record by 3-0 without dropping a set in these three encounters. She had a solid start to the match and broke Kostyuk’s serve in the seventh game of the set to take a 4-3 lead. The Pole earned the opportunity to serve for the set at 5-4, but her opponent refused to go down easily and broke her to level the set.

Kostyuk held her serve in the next game, and now Swiatek had the chance to drag the set into a tiebreaker. However, she faltered big time and ended up committing two double-faults to create a set point for Kostyuk. The Ukrainian made no mistakes in clinching the decisive break and winning the first set.

The World No. 3 began the second set brilliantly and broke Kostyuk’s serve right away. But she would fail to hold on to her own serve and committed another double-fault to once again set up a break point for Kostyuk. The latter broke right back and took the match out of Swiatek’s reach soon after. She won the next five games in a row to win the match and advance to the quarterfinals.

Analyzing the result, Roddick harked back to Swiatek’s dominant campaign at Wimbledon last season. Notably, the Pole had dropped just one set in the five matches that she had played on the way to her maiden Wimbledon triumph. Roddick believes that while Swiatek breezes past her opponents in one-sided matches, the nerves tend to get the better of her in evenly-matched contests.

Not to mention, Swiatek’s partnership with Francisco Roig hasn’t exactly worked out so far. She had appointed the Spaniard as her coach before the clay-court season and after she had parted ways with Wim Fissette following her first-round exit at the Miami Open. However, her results still didn’t get any better on clay. The 26-year-old suffered second-round exits in both Stuttgart and Madrid but then had a strong run to the semis in Rome.

Despite her underwhelming form, Swiatek was expected to reach the later stages at the French Open due to her previous success at the Grand Slam. However, her fourth-round elimination has only raised even more eyebrows over her partnership with Roig. The World No. 3 gave a major update regarding potential changes within her team following the defeat to Kostyuk.

Iga Swiatek expected to soon part ways with Francisco Roig

Swiatek revealed that she hadn’t appointed Roig as her permanent coach and that the partnership between them was always meant to be temporary. The two are likely to part ways after the conclusion of the grass-court season.

“I hired [Francisco] knowing that a second coach would be added at some point, because he won’t do the entire season with me. For now, I’m not thinking about it too much, because I know that we’ll do the next trips together and probably after Wimbledon I might think about it more,” she said during the post-match press conference.

The defeat to Kostyuk can be a major hit to Swiatek in the rankings. Having earned 780 points last year for reaching the semifinals of the French Open, Swiatek is now set to lose 540 points due to her fourth-round exit. Though she is likely to still maintain her position in the top three, the gap to the No. 1 spot is expected to get significantly bigger.

At 7,273 points, Swiatek already stands far behind World No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka’s tally of 9,960. The latter has the opportunity to increase the gap even further as she is still alive in the French Open and is set to take on Naomi Osaka in the fourth round. It remains to be seen what the rankings will look like after the conclusion of the Grand Slam.

With her clay swing coming to an early end, Swiatek will now be shifting her focus to the upcoming grass swing. She is likely to begin her season with the HSBC Championships, which will begin on June 8.