The second tie of the 2024 World Tennis League was also incredibly exciting, with The Kites proving to be the better team than The Eagles.
In the first tie of the 2024 World Tennis League, The Falcons beat The Hawks, mostly thanks to Andrey Rublev's sensational performance in the overtime and the match tie-break, which decided the tie.
The second tie was also sent into overtime, but Iga Swiatek couldn't force a match tie-break against Jasmine Paolini, who was the most valuable player for her team, playing in three matches.
She started in the mixed doubles, teaming up with Casper Ruud. The two were supposed to take on Stefanos Tsitsipas and Paula Badosa, but the Greek player was replaced by Alexander Shevchenko.
Paolini is one of the best doubles players on the WTA Tour, even playing at the 2024 WTA Finals, and that was visible on the court. She and Ruud won the mixed doubles match 6-4.
Ruud and Shevchenko then stayed on the court for the men's singles match. The Norwegian player broke his opponent's serve first, and even though Shevchenko was able to break back, Ruud broke again to win the match 6-4.
With those two wins, The Kites were already up 12-8. In the women's doubles, Paolini returned to the court, teaming up with Simona Halep. The duo took on Iga Swiatek and Badosa, who played her second match as well.
Halep and Paolini were the better team, winning the match 7-5 to bring their overall lead to 19-13. With that, Swiatek had an incredibly difficult task ahead of the last match of the tie against Paolini.
For the Italian player, it was already the third match of the tie, but she played incredibly, even though she lost. Losing by six games in the overall score, Swiatek needed a big win to have a chance for a comeback.
But Paolini did extremely well to avoid being broken early on. On top of that, she was the first player to break, leading 4-2 after six games played, and at 5-3, she was serving for the match.
Swiatek, however, started an inspired streak. The World No. 2 player won four games in a row. She saved three match points, making it 5-5, and after that, broke her opponent's serve again to win the match 7-5.
Since Swiatek won the last match of the tie and her team was trailing, the tie was sent into overtime. The score was 24-20 for Paolini's team, meaning Swiatek had to win four games in a row to force a match tie-break.
But Paolini was just too solid, winning already the first game of the overtime, which meant she ended the tie victoriously for her team. The Kites won 25-20, with only three players taking part, as Nick Kyrgios didn't make it to the tennis court.