No. 1 title, 4 Grand Slams: Can the 'invincible' Iga Swiatek win Wimbledon, too?

The invincible Iga Swiatek is coming off her third title in the past four years on the French Openrsquos red clay Last September she won a championship on the US Openrsquos hard courts for the first time Thatrsquos also the surface used at the Australian Open where shersquos been to the semifinalsAnd what about on grass courts Wimbledon which begins Monday has been her least successful Grand Slam tournament so far Swiatek is just 53 at the All England Club mdash compare that to her 282 mark at Roland Garros for example mdash and those three losses came in the first round third round and fourth roundSwiatek who has been ranked No 1 since April 2022 offered a bit of insight on how she views her game on grass when she was asked in Paris this month about whether reaching the latter stages of a major is still a big deal to herldquoWell it depends because if I would make a quarterfinal of Wimbledon I would be like over the moonrdquo Swiatek replied ldquoand I wouldnrsquot believe that Irsquom in that placerdquoPolandrsquos Iga Swiatek returns the ball to Francersquos Alize Cornet during a third round womenrsquos singles match on day six of the Wimbledon tennis championships in London Saturday July 2 2022 Swiatek is just 53 at the All England Club compared to her 282 mark at Roland Garros AP PhotoKirsty Wigglesworth FileSo even though other players might concur with the sort of assessment Claire Liu an American ranked in the Top 100 provided after facing Swiatek in Paris this year mdash ldquoIrsquod say shersquos good on pretty much any surfacerdquo mdash the subject of playing on the slick green stuff tends to bring certain sentiments to mind for the 22yearold from PolandTwo words she repeats when discussing grass ldquouncomfortablerdquo and ldquochallengerdquo And yet letrsquos not forget Swiatek was the 2018 junior champion at Wimbledon so itrsquos not as if itrsquos a completely foreign surface or settingAlso Read Novak Djokovic loses Wimbledon top seed to Carlos Alcaraz Iga Swiatek No 1 in womens categoryStill she insists ldquoOn grass sometimes itrsquos tougher and I still have to learn a lotrdquoldquoIt just feels like yoursquore going to go on court and not play the way you lsquoshouldlsquordquo she said making air quotes with her fingers ldquoor the way you lsquocouldrsquo you know So this thing is adding more pressurerdquoAll of what she does so well on clay or hard courts seemingly should translate just fine to grassThat big forehand of hers The way she can defend so well And above all the way Swiatek can think her way around a match find an opponentrsquos weaknesses and counter her own with tweaks here and thereThere are to be sure other women who have already shown they can do well on grass and at WimbledonPlayers such as 2022 champion Elena Rybakina 2022 runnerup Ons Jabeur twotime winner Petra Kvitova 2021 semifinalist Aryna SabalenkaBut there are not a lot of folks who are going to doubt that Swiatek will figure things out at some pointldquoItrsquos the powerrdquo said Agnieszka Radwanska the 2012 runnerup to Serena Williams at the All England Club and the only Polish woman to reach the singles final there in the past 85 yearsldquoThere are other players hitting the ball very strongrdquo Radwanska said before explaining that Swiatekrsquos heavy topspin gives her shots more of a chance of landing in with consistency as opposed to the flat strokes that create more misses ldquoto the fencerdquoldquoThatrsquos the differencerdquo Radwanska said ldquoA big differencerdquoAfter watching her beat Karolina Muchova in three sets in the final at Roland Garros French Open tournament director Amelie Mauresmo said she thinks Swiatek has what it takes to thrive at the All England ClubldquoShe has to make maybe one or two adjustments maybe technically or in her gamerdquo said Mauresmo a former No 1ranked player who won Wimbledon and the Australian Open in 2006 ldquobut I donrsquot see why with her consistency with her physical abilities and of course mentally mdash how she fights and how she gives a lot of trouble to the other girls mdash she wouldnrsquot be able to have a breakthrough thererdquoWith AP inputs