Paris2024: Swiatek bow out after a shock defeat to Zheng Qinwen

Iga Swiatek suffered a stunning defeat against China’s Zheng Qinwen in the semi-finals of the Olympic women’s singles tennis tournament at Roland Garros on Thursday.

The 23-year-old Poland’s world number one who was on winning run on clay in Paris, failed to clinch a final ticket after a straight sets 6-2,7-5 defeat in an 1 hour and 51 minutes of play on Court Philippe Chatrier at Roland Garros, the site of many of her career-best moments.

After defeating Iga Swiatek, the 21-year-old Zheng Qinwen became only the fourth woman to defeat the world number one in straight sets on clay since 2019 enroute to her way into the gold medal match on Saturday.

Ending the top seed’s 25-match win streak in Paris to become the first Chinese tennis player in an Olympic final, Zheng Qinwen also became the first asian-born player to reach a women’s or men’s Singles final at the Olympics and also the first to defeat the WTA’s world number one on clay, since the opta  rankings were first published in 1975.

Zheng is currently on a 10-match clay-court winning streak of her own. Just over a week ago, the Chinese No.1 went to Palermo and successfully defended her title at that WTA 250 event to kick off this run of winning form on the surface.

For her efforts, Swiatek still has a chance to exit Paris with hardware. The world’s top-ranked player will participate in the bronze-medal final later this week.