Swiatek's Insane Doha Winning Streak Ends With Stunning Loss To Ostapenko
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Iga Swiatek lost in the semi-finals of the 2025 Qatar Open in Doha to an incredibly inspired Jelena Ostapenko.
There haven't been many players as dominant at one event as Swiatek has been at the Qatar Open. The Polish player has won the last three editions of the tournament in Doha, and she was on a 12-match winning streak in Doha before taking on Ostapenko.
She has also won 28 of the last 29 sets she played at the event, with the only lost set coming in her third-round match against Linda Noskova.
In fact, this year's edition of the Qatar Open put Swiatek against probably every rival who has been able to consistently trouble her in the past. She started against Maria Sakkari, who led the head-to-head against the Pole 3-0 a few years ago.
Then she played against Noskova, who famously stunned her at the Australian Open last year and pushed her to the limits in their following matches as well, and in the quarter-finals, Swiatek beat Elena Rybakina.
Before their meeting in Doha this year, Rybakina was only one of two players who Swiatek played more than once and had a winning head-to-head against the Pole. That changed after the Pole tied it at 4-4 with her win in Qatar.
But after beating Rybakina, the only player left with the better head-to-head awaited Swiatek in the semi-finals. Her opponent was Jelena Ostapenko, who actually never lost to Swiatek before. The Latvian had an incredible 4-0 head-to-head score against the Pole before this meeting.
In this match, the 2017 French Open champion proved why that was the case. She completely blew the WTA World No. 2 off the court, dominating her in every aspect of the game.
Ostapenko started the match by breaking her opponent's serve. In fact, she won eight of the first nine rallies, and it quickly became obvious that this wouldn't be an easy day at the office for Swiatek.
The Polish player had only one break point in the first set, and after she couldn't use it, Ostapenko punished her. The Latvian player added another break to win the first set of the match 6-3.
Swiatek knew she needed a comeback, but she was just overwhelmed by what her opponent was able to do on the court. Ostapenko just doesn't seem to be bothered by anything that Swiatek does on the court.
The Latvian player played just an incredible match. She broke Swiatek's serve every single time in the second set to beat the five-time Grand Slam champion 6-3, 6-1, ending her 12-match unbeaten run in Doha.
Ostapenko will now prepare for the final match. In the final, the Latvian player will await the winner of the other semi-final between Amanda Anisimova and Ekaterina Alexandrova.
