THE CHAMPIONSHIPS

June 28, 2021

Iga Swiatek

Press Conference

I. SWIATEK/Hsieh S.

6-4, 6-4

THE MODERATOR: Questions, please.

Q. Can you talk through the match, just how you felt like you played and also handled the circumstances and situation of being on No. 1 Court.

IGA SWIATEK: It was great. I love that whole tradition, the whole atmosphere that we had on court. Coming back at the same court that I played as a junior, it bring back so many memories. I was pretty excited to play there.

But about the match, I just feel like my coach prepared me really well. We used like the best tactics possible for Su-Wei. I wanted to play powerful, really strong, not let her use her touch and all that tricky balls with weird spin. Yeah, I did that pretty well.

I wanted to be offensive and stay aggressive. I'm pretty happy that even though I had two games when I backed out a little bit, I wasn't backing out till the end, but I went forward. That was cool.

Q. You talked before Wimbledon about the difficulty of playing on grass, that you don't have experience of playing on grass. That was a very impressive performance for someone who is only winning their second match on a professional tournament level on grass. You must be very pleased with your performance, the way you served and moved on the grass?

IGA SWIATEK: I am. I'm really happy that my serve was working. It really gave me a lot. It was basically like on typical grass court match because I was just dominating on my serves. It gave me a lot of confidence.

Yeah, you know, I think the serve is that kind of thing that I can lean on when I have problems because it's the same no matter what kind of surface I'm playing on. When I approach the serve, I just know that it's my big weapon. It was really working today and I'm happy about that.

But, yeah, every match is going to give me a lot of confidence just because, as you said, I only won two matches on grass on WTA level. Yeah, let's hope for more.

Q. Speaking of the two matches that you've now won on grass, is there a sense at all of relief or accomplishment of getting this Wimbledon main draw win done and over with or was it just another match?

IGA SWIATEK: When I was, like, before the grass season, I wanted it to be like every match because I wanted just to be calm and not be really pumped out that I'm playing a Grand Slam because I don't have experience and it's going to be hard. But it was impossible to maintain that mood.

Yeah, I was pretty excited. My attitude changed from Eastbourne which wasn't really positive because it was really nice and easy to play for me without any expectations. But when I came here, I realized that I'm on Wimbledon, and everybody started talking about my junior run again. I realized that, Hey, it would be nice to win some matches (smiling).

Yeah, I mean, I had some expectations. It is a bit of relief. Also the tournament just started and I hope I'm going to keep going. I'm just going to perform well, and actually, learn something because I only played one week on grass. Even for clay sometimes it's not enough for me to transition well. Hopefully day by day I'm going to just stay focused and just keep improving. That's my goal.

Q. You talked before Wimbledon about maybe looking at other players and how they've transitioned from clay to grass, how clay-courters like Rafa played on grass, maybe Simona Halep. Whose example did you take onto the court today?

IGA SWIATEK: Actually, I was watching some of their matches. I was watching basically the finals. They were, like, dominating, playing really well. I thought, Hey, if you're going to have a day like that, it doesn't really matter, you're going to win. They were just so confident.

Maybe that wasn't, like, the best way to learn because they were just playing too good. I need to watch some more tennis on grass and to see how people are maybe coming back after some difficulties because that's going to give more than just being and having the flow and winning. Basically if you're going to play like Simona when she won, you're going to win.

Yeah, I need to watch some other matches, maybe not the finals, just to see how it's going when nothing is perfect sometimes and how other players approach their problems. It's hard to see that sometimes from the laptop screen, but maybe it's going to give me some ideas.

Yeah, just need some experience. If I'm not able to play more on grass because the season is so short, maybe that's a good way to get it.

Q. You have a little bit of a lighter schedule this year at Wimbledon since you're not playing the doubles. Within the bubble, what is occupying your free time between matches?

IGA SWIATEK: I love the hotel. It's pretty big. There's like a huge lounge. I was talking to Kaia a lot, but she's going to play tomorrow. Again, our schedules are different. It's going to be hard to socialize.

But I'm just trying to enjoy. Even though we're in a bubble, it doesn't feel like it because the hotel is really, really big. Yeah, there is, like, good food. Basically I'm eating a lot. Actually nothing. I just did some LEGOs. I was watching some movies because I haven't watched, like, a lot of movies. I'm really lacking in the knowledge of, like, good movies. I'm trying to catch up.

Yeah, if you have some good movies, just text me and I'll watch them.