Fasten your seatbelts, as the ‘Queen of Clay’ is all set to kick-start her clay court season in Stuttgart in just a few hours from now. Iga Swiatek will take on Belgium’s Elise Mertens in her first match at the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix. Swiatek had a stellar start to her season in 2024, she has already clinched two titles this year. Will the third be in one of her favorite destinations on Tour?

Iga Swiatek has a perfect 8-0 record in Stuttgart. She has won the titles back to back in the last two editions. It’ll be interesting to see if the world number one can get her hat-trick this time around in this prestigious tournament. While, Mertens on the other hand, has been through some ups and downs this year. This match will be her third against a world number one and her first in nearly four years. Can she cause a major upset in Stuttgart?

Iga Swiatek vs Elise Mertens: Preview

Iga Swiatek had a title-winning run at the Qatar Open and BNP Paribas Open this year. She has also secured a runners up spot for her nation, at the United Cup 2024. Recently, she was seen leading Poland to the BJK Cup Finals with their win against Switzerland in the qualifiers. Before the BJK Cup qualifiers, Iga Swiatek faced a surprising defeat at the hands of Russia’s Ekaterina Alexandrova in the R16 of the Miami Open.

Alexandrova defeated the number one by 6-4,6-2. Iga Swiatek had managed to hit 7 aces and committed 4 double faults throughout the match. Her first-serve win percentage was 75% and her second-serve win percentage was 72% in that match. Swiatek won 9 of her service games against Alexandrova. Looking at her stats for this year, her performance in the Miami Open was pretty much ordinary.

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The 22-year-old Polish tennis star has hit around 47 aces this year and has committed 37 double faults. Swiatek has won 83.1% of her service games and 47.3% of her return games in 2024. She has been really impressive in terms of her services this year. Her first-serve win percentage is currently at 68.8%. Can she further improve her numbers with yet another longer run at the Stuttgart Open?

Perhaps, Elise Mertens can give the answer later today. The 28-year-old Belgian tennis player reached the finals of the Hobart International earlier this year. But over there, she was defeated by America’s Emma Navarro by 6-1,4-6,7-5. After that, she made a QF run at the Linz Open and the Charleston Open. In the Charleston Open, Elise Mertens was yet again defeated by an American. Danielle Collins defeated her by 6-3,6-4 to secure her place in the SF. Mertens faced Germany’s Tatjana Maria in her previous match in Stuttgart.

In her first-round match, the Belgian defeated the German by 6-1,4-6,6-0. If we look at the statistics from that match, Mertens could only manage to hit 2 aces and committed 3 double faults. Her first serve win percentage stood at 80% but dropped to 46% for her second serve. Mertens won 8 of her service games against Maria.

Elise Mertens has hit 67 aces and committed 92 double faults so far this season. This clearly indicates her struggle with serves over the last few matches. However, if we look at the win percentage in her service games, it’s currently 68.8%. While she has won 35.4% of her return games and won 66.8% of her first serves. Can she ace her aces against the world number one?

Swiatek vs Mertens: Head-to-Head

Iga Swiatek and Elise Mertens haven’t met each other earlier in any of the singles matches before in their career. So, we have to look at some other records before we finally jump into the prediction for this match. Elise Mertens holds 11 Top 10 wins so far in her career. But she hasn’t yet defeated a world number one in her career. She has been in the Top 20 for nearly four seasons (2018-2022). Can she bring back her glorious days yet against this year?

While Iga Swiatek recently celebrated her 99th week at the top of women’s singles ranking. She will now look forward to extending it to a few more weeks and finishing the season on the highest note. But who’s having the edge in this intriguing contest? Let us have a look at the prediction for this R16 clash.

Prediction: Iga Swiatek to win in two sets

Iga Swiatek will definitely win this match, mic drop! If we look at the current form and their record on the clay courts over the years, there would hardly be any doubts about who has the edge in this match. Having said that, we must also keep in mind that tennis has often come out with surprising results in the past. This will be Iga Swiatek’s first match on the clay court this season, and she has quite extraordinary records on this surface. Iga Swiatek’s 3 out of her 4 Grand Slam titles have come on the clay surface. 

Elise Mertens has only managed to reach the fourth round on three occasions at the French Open in her entire career so far. It’s Merten’s calm and composure versus Swiatek’s aggressive brand of tennis. Iga Swiatek won the title here twice in her career but Merten’s best result was reaching the first round in 2019 at this tournament. Iga Swiatek has a win-loss record of 22-3 this season while Elise Mertens has a record of 12-9. It will be interesting to see how well the Belgian can hold her nerves while facing the world number one.