Skipping Wimbledon warm-ups was the smarter decision, says Swiatek

Iga Swiatek is approaching Wimbledon a little differently this time around after skipping all the tune-up tournaments, but the top seed thinks it's the best possible move for her as she bids to win her maiden crown at the All England Club.

For all her achievements over the last few seasons, the five-time Grand Slam champion remains largely unproven on grasscourts with none of the 22 singles titles in her vast cabinet coming on the surface.

Having been handed a quarterfinal defeat by wild card Elina Svitolina last year, the 23-year-old Pole will look to improve on that when she begins her Wimbledon campaign against former world number four Sofia Kenin on Tuesday.

“At the beginning, for sure it was tricky,” Swiatek said when asked how she felt about her Wimbledon preparations on Saturday.

“I'm happy that I came here early because there is a huge difference between the grass that we have in our own country, for example, and here.

“Day after day I felt like I'm getting more rhythm and I can really feel the ball better. I feel good. For sure we approached this year a little bit differently basically because of the amount of matches that I played in the first part of the season.”

Fresh off her fourth French Open crown, the world number one withdrew from the Berlin Ladies Open earlier in the month, citing overall physical and mental fatigue after an intense nine weeks.

Swiatek, whose father Tomasz is a former Olympic rower and competed in the men's quadruple sculls at the 1988 Olympics in Seoul, confirmed that she will participate in the Paris 2024 Olympics.

“It means a lot... We have kind of an Olympic tradition in my family. Olympics were always this kind of tournament that was the most important, kind of above everything else,” she said.

“From my side as a professional, I'm going to treat it as any other tournament, to keep my routines, be able to perform my best. But it would mean obviously a lot.”

Second seed Coco Gauff said she went through a dark time after her first-round exit from Wimbledon last year, but the setback put her career in perspective as she turned her form around.

Gauff, 20, has since won the US Open and reached the semifinals of Australian Open and French Open.

“I wish a year ago, me after that match could see me now,” the American said on Saturday. “That was a tough moment for me. I think the first two, three weeks after that, I was really in a dark place.

“It was tough for me to realise I have so much time. When that happens you just feel the weight of everything on you. I think I had high expectations at that age. I still do.”

Gauff said she did not feel any extra pressure ahead of playing fellow American Caroline Dolehide in the first round on Monday.

“With Wimbledon, I'm really relaxed going into this year. I didn't have a great Wimbledon last year. It's like it couldn't get any worse, it can only get better or the same,” she said.

The world number two said it did not matter to her that top seed Swiatek, who has beaten her in 11 of 12 matches, was placed the other side of the draw since she needed to beat everybody to win.

Wimbledon third seed Aryna Sabalenka said she was not fully ready for Monday's first-round clash with Emina Bektas as the two-time Australian Open champion continues to struggle with a rare shoulder injury.

Sabalenka, who also suffered a lower back injury earlier this year and was down with a sickness during the French Open earlier this month, said her health was a reason she had chosen not to play in next month's Paris Olympics.

“We are doing everything we can with my team to make sure I'll be able to play my first match here, but, no, I'm not 100% ready,” Sabalenka said on Saturday.

“It [the muscle] is teres major — it's really a specific injury and a rare one. Probably I'm just the second or the third tennis player who injured that muscle.

“The most annoying thing is that I can do anything. I can practise, I can hit my groundstrokes. I'm struggling with serving. That's really annoying. You don't feel like you're injured — but if you tell me to serve, I'm going to go through pain.

The Belarusian, who reached the semifinals last year, said she had not given up on Wimbledon yet.

“We did an MRI, we did everything. We did a lot of rehab, a lot of treatments and everything,” she said.

“As someone who's been fighting through a lot of different pains in the past months, I still have my hopes.” 

Reuters