By Richard Pagliaro | @Tennis_Now | Thursday, May 1, 2025
Photo credit: Hannah Peters/Getty
Midway through the second set, a disconsolate Iga Swiatek slammed a stray ball off the red clay in an eruption of day-long frustration.
Coco Gauff unleashed wrecking-ball brilliance in a 6-1, 6-1 demolition of defending champion Swiatek to charge into her maiden Mutua Madrid Open final.
Playing for her first final since she won Roland Garros last June, Swiatek candidly confessed “everything kind of collapsed” in a crushing defeat.
“I didn’t play well even on these matches that I won. I think I pushed kind of with my head for more than I even like should, tennis-wise,” Swiatek told the media in Madrid afterward. “Today for sure everything kind of collapsed, you know, both tennis-wise and I feel like I wasn’t even in the right place with my feet before the shots.
“So I wish I would have moved better, because I think that would get me any opportunity to bounce back, because this is usually what happens. But today, yeah, for sure I didn’t move well.”
Overall, the second-ranked Swiatek had dominated Gauff winning 11 of their prior 14 meetings, including sweeping all 10 sets they had played on clay. In fact before dispensing today’s beatdown, Gauff only managed to win more than five games in a clay-court set just once in their rivalry and that came in a 7-6(3), 6-3 defeat in their maiden meeting in the 2021 Rome semifinals.
The 21-year-old Gauff was nearly flawless on serve: She slammed seven aces, including several game-ending aces, won 19 of 21 first-serve points and did not face a break point.
The biggest stunner in this upset was Gauff boldly stood toe-to-toe with Swiatek in forehand exchanges and beat the reigning Roland Garros champion into errors.
It was as if Swiatek did not believe she could hang in extended rallies. When she tried changing direction down the line, the second seed often found mayhem instead. Swiatek scattered 21 forehand unforced errors, while Gauff committed only four forehand errors.
Scratch beneath the scoreline and consider Swiatek is facing some serious challenges on multiple fronts. She hasn’t reached a final in 11 months, she’s feeling the pressure of defending 4,000 ranking points with her Madrid, Rome and Roland Garros title defenses, powerful ball strikers including Gauff, nemesis Jelena Ostapenko, Mirra Andreeva and Madison Keys are treating her second serve with disdain and she hasn’t found her groove yet with coach Wim Fissette.
In today’s post-match presser, Swiatek revealed some of that stress—and complete confusion—conceding she didn’t have a Plan B.
“For sure I feel like I haven’t been moving well and, you know, the tennis also was like on and off, you know, for most of the tournament,” Swiatek said. “So I wasn’t really sure what I have in my tool box, you know, but yeah, for sure, like I didn’t even have a plan B because nothing was working today, so, yeah.”
Playing with the weight of the world on her shoulders and 4,000 ranking points hanging over her head, Swiatek said she’s got to shake stress and find her feet during this crucial title defense run.
“For sure I feel heavy, and you are like forcing everything instead of it going by kind of intuition and by itself,” Swiatek said. “Because I know how I can move, and usually I didn’t have to think about it much. But for last weeks it hasn’t been that easy.
“I’ve been like forcing myself to go lower, to be more precise with my feet, because it’s not going by itself. So hopefully one day it’s going to click, but I’m not expecting anything, I’m just going to try to work on that.”
