After producing one of the best weeks of grand slam tennis this year, the US Open moved into its second week with high expectations. To start proceedings on the second Monday at Arthur Ashe stadium, Polish star Iga Swiatek faced Tokyo Olympics gold medalist Belinda Bencic for a place in the quarter-finals.

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The duo met once on the WTA tour earlier this year in the finals of Adelaide International. Swiatek won the match comfortably in straight sets, 6-2, 6-2. However, Bencic entered the US Open with loads of confidence as she won medals in both singles and doubles events in Tokyo.

Let’s see how the match progressed.

It was a heavy-weight encounter right from the start as both the players hit powerful ground strokes to outpower each other. Swiatek had to fight hard on her serve to fend off break points as the Swiss rose her defense game right from the word ‘go‘. 

Belinda Bencic edged past Iga Swiatek in a nail-biting first set

After saving five break points, the Polish player lost her serve and gave a slight advantage to Bencic. Till the tenth game of the first set, it looked as if the Swiss player would clinch the first set without much trouble.

But, Bencic played a terrible service game that involved a double-fault and allowed Swiatek to level the first set, 5-5. After playing well for the first nine games, Bencic’s level dropped a bit.

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Now, it was Swiatek’s turn to turn up the aggression. With an attacking game like hers, it wouldn’t be fair to expect an error-free game but the rising star did just enough to take the first set to a tie-breaker.

Even in the tie-breaker, the Pole raced past Bencic to obtain a quick lead of 4-2. But, Bencic fought back, thanks to a couple of errors from Swiatek on her own serve. In a tie-break that went on for more than twenty minutes, each player had four set points and neither of them converted.

At 13-12 in the breaker, the Swiss player finally managed to win the set after a forehand error from Swiatek. Both the players made repeated errors throughout the tie-breaker but it was an enthralling hour of tennis.

Bencic closes out the second set comfortably to reach quarter-finals at US Open

Coming to the second set, Swiatek couldn’t recover from that huge blow in the first as she leaked too many errors for Bencic to capitalize. Likewise, the Swiss player broke Swiatek’s game and rose to a commanding lead of 4-1.

Two games away from sealing a quarter-final berth, Bencic didn’t succumb to nerves and forced errors from Swiatek. But, the Pole held her serve and managed to stay just one break of serve away to level things out in the second set.

However, Bencic was in no mood to give up her service as she closed out the match on serve to register her first victory over Iga Swiatek. The Swiss player is the first to reach the last eight at the US Open. Bencic will await the winner of the fourth round matchup between Shelby Rogers and Emma Raducanu.

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