The Latvian tennis player gave the surprise of eliminating second-seeded Polish Iga Swiatek in straight sets (6-4, 6-3) in the round of 16 of the WTA 1000 Indian Wells. Ostapenko will have as next rival the winner of the duel between Leylah Fernandez and Shelby Rogers, for a place in the semifinals.
Iga Swiatek She came as the clear favorite, not only to this game but to the fight for the title, especially after the surprise elimination of Karolina Pliskova the previous day. The Pole came from two dream presentations against both Petra Martic and Veronika Kudermetova. In both games, the 2020 Roland Garros winner gave up just five games in total, so her level seemed to have no ceiling this week.
For its part, Jelena Ostapenko I wanted to give the tournament another blow. The Latvian had had an extremely comfortable opening match against the experienced Su-wei Hsieh, then defeated the Kazakh Yulia Putintseva in a moody three-set battle.
Ostapenko shakes the women’s box
An even start to the game, with an Ostapenko suffering the most from her serve games. Swiatek, for his part, showed his usual solidity at that start, although leaving some doubts with a string of errors. The first break of the match would come for the Pole, who was up 4-3, and seemed to take an important advantage. However, everything would collapse in a matter of minutes. Ostapenko brought out his courage and made two breaks in a row to turn the story around. It was 6-4 for the Latvian.
Iga wanted to leave behind that closing set for oblivion, and again the second set began to break up. The Pole was entrenched in that difference, sustaining her service without leaving chances for her rival. But again, Ostapenko proposed a mobility that made Swiatek uncomfortable, recovering the break to reach 3-3. All were doubts in the face of the definition, until the Latvian herself again capitalized on an opportunity to give herself the chance to serve for the match. Finally, Jelena Ostapenko sealed her victory in two sets.
