Iga Swiatek revealed that a severe ankle injury in 2017 could have ruined her professional tennis career.
Over the last two years 21-year-old Swiatek has shot to the top of the WTA rankings following a French Open and the US Open double in 2022. Swiatek has shown no signs of letting up in 2023 either as she has already won the Qatar Open and the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix and now has her sights set on a victory at the upcoming Italian Open.
However, it has not always been plain sailing for the young Polish superstar and she suffered a potentially life-changing ankle injury during her junior career. The injury ruled Swiatek out for eight months and the three-time Grand Slam winner thought she would never play tennis again following surgery on her ankle.
"Well, at that point of my life, basically the problem was that I thought I'm not going to, like, play tennis any more because I was a teenager and it was a big thing already after surgery."
When speaking to the media ahead of her match against Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova at the 2023 Italian Open, Swiatek said there was a time when she doubted if she would make a full recovery. The Polish player also outlined some of the financial and psychological strain an early career injury had on her.
"I wouldn't say, like, I dealed with normal issues that an injured player has in their pro career. It was more like just not being sure if I'm going to be able to come back. It's not like I always knew that I'm going to be a tennis player. I feel like every year I needed to kind of prove myself that I'm going in the right direction. I still didn't believe that I'm going to be a pro until I actually came to WTA and won some matches."
"Also there was, like, the issue of if we're going to have also money to continue, start like a little bit from the beginning because this is something that suddenly may change your life path. I'm pretty happy that we managed, me and my dad, to make me come back. He also found resources for me to be able to train and have practices and find coaches."
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