Iga Swiatek makes quick work of Alison Riske to claim 30th straight win

French Open
Iga Swiatek French Open Roland Garros

World No 1 Iga Swiatek continued her incredible winning streak on Thursday in the second round of the French Open with a 6-0, 6-3 victory over American Alison Riske.

Riske had pulled off a remarkable comeback win over Garbiñe Muguruza at Indian Wells in March from 6-0, 3-0 down, but she was not able to engineer a repeat in Paris against the top women’s player in the world right now.

Though Riske was able to save three break points in the 10th game of the match to finally get on the board and avoid what appeared to be a looming double bagel.

Riske also went on to save match point at 6-0, 5-2 with a second-serve ace but her resistance ultimately proved futile.

Swiatek slammed 23 winners past Riske while committing 15 unforced errors in the 61 minutes the pair were out on the court.

The 20-year-old Pole lost just 10 points in seven service games.

Swiatek improved to 3-0 against Riske in their career head to head record with this victory.

All three wins for Swiatek over Riske have come on clay.

Both of their previous meetings were at Masters level when they faced off in both Madrid and Rome last year.

Montenegro’s Danka Kovinic will be Swiatek’s next opponent at Roland Garros

Kovinic upset 25th seed Liudmila Samsonova in the opening round. In the Round of 64, she matched her best-ever Grand Slam performance thanks to a 6-3, 7-5 win over Anna Karolina Schmiedlova which propelled her into the third round for the first time.

Kovinic also reached the third round of the Australian Open earlier this year.

Earlier, French wildcard Leolia Jeanjean delighted the Roland Garros crowd with a 6-2, 6-2 upset of Karolina Pliskova.

Jeanjean said: “I’m very surprised. The Top 50 player I played during the first round, I won. I didn’t know I would win. I was surprised. It seems that my level of play disturbs them. I thought that I would not win, but it’s not the case. I’m very surprised, but I’m also very happy, because it means that maybe I have the level to be there on the tour.

“This match was full of emotions through and through. I managed to unroll my tactics to make her move back and forth, to put spin on my ball. I didn’t know it would happen this way, once again. It’s incredible thinking that I actually won in two sets against a Top 10 player, a previous No.1 worldwide. It’s incredible.”

Iga Swiatek

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