Every professional athlete knows that success is a combination of incredible amount of hard work and a little bit of luck.
Sometimes, tennis players don't have enough of that luck, and sometimes, they have more than needed. Two years ago, Andrey Rublev didn't have to play a single match to get into the semifinals of the 2021 Qatar Open in Doha. Two years later, Iga Swiatek plays the same event in a WTA draw, and she needed only one match to reach the same stage.
Both of these runs came thanks to some withdrawals and a bye in the first round. Since the world no. 1 from Poland is the first-seeded player in Doha, she awaited Danielle Collins in the second round, and destroyed her 6-0, 6-1. After her match, she said:
"[I felt] pretty confident. I'm happy that I was kind of composed and from the beginning till the end pretty focused and disciplined with tactics. I didn't really let Danielle get into the rhythm. I wanted to be aggressive. I'm pretty happy that I did that well."
In the quarterfinals, Swiatek was supposed to take on Belinda Bencic, who came back from a set and two breaks down against Victoria Azarenka.
But the Swiss player played quite a lot of tennis recently, as she's the 2023 Abu Dhabi Open champion, and withdrew from her 2023 Qatar Open quarterfinal match.
Therefore, Swiatek advanced directly to the semifinals, while playing only one match. Up next, she will meet the fourth-seeded Coco Gauff or no. 8, Veronika Kudermetova.
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