With Wimbledon now just around the corner, most players are scrambling to get in as much practice on grass courts as possible.
Not Iga Swiatek.
The former world number one will play her first and only grass-court tournament following the French Open this week at Bad Homburg, before then returning to the All-England Club.
Over the years, this has not been a surface which has been kind to her, with the transition from her favoured clay often cumbersome.
As such, she heads into this period of the season with few points to defend, and even fewer expectations after a tough 2025 thus far where her title drought has persisted.
With that in mind, Andy Roddick has sought to provide some counsel for the 24-year-old.
Iga Swiatek handed key Wimbledon advice
Speaking on the Tennis Channel Live podcast, it was actually Coco Vandeweghe who kickstarted things, when asked what Iga Swiatek must change to reignite her year. ‘There’s no time to change it now,’ she began, before then listing a few areas of improvement.
‘I think she could definitely use more of a closed stance forehand. I think that could help with that extreme grip.
‘I think everything just sits up when it comes to Iga’s game because of the heavy topspin that she implements, not only on her forehand, but also on her serve. It’s more of a kick serve or a topspin serve, both first and second. So on the grass, that’s just going to sit up.
‘And with these women, how good they are at returning, that is just easy pickings and that’s why she struggles, because she gets rushed on that forehand wing, the athleticism gets hampered in that way because she can’t neutralise the rallies soon enough.’
Roddick then built on this ahead of Wimbledon: ‘Now, specifically to Iga on grass, I’d like to see her take more balls in the backhand side and not try to do that little circle to hit the inside out forehand as much.
‘What makes her a superhero other as far as RPMs and getting the ball up and away and pulling people off the court becomes a bit of a liability, especially if she has to run to hit it. I would tell her, if I’m her coach, the simplest adjustment we can make is let’s take a lot more backhands.
‘If you’re just left of centre or even if you’re in the middle of the court, the ball on our backhand will be way more effective on the grass getting through the court. I think she has to mix up her second serve.
‘She doesn’t like to up the wrist profile on it, but I think she has to run them into the bodies a little bit more, so she’s actually getting pop-ups on that second one as opposed to like Coco said, people getting a clean hit and be able to direct that to the forehand side, where the grip is just too far over.’
Despite her tough year, Wim Fisette insists that Swiatek has transformed women’s tennis during her period on the WTA tour.
How has Iga Swiatek historically performed at Wimbledon?
As touched upon earlier, grass is the furthest thing from Swiatek’s preferred surface.
With a fierce style that favours heavy spin, on the turf this just leaves her open to attack as the ball sits up for her opponents.
This therefore explains why, historically, it’s her worst-performing Grand Slam, having never got past the quarter-finals at the event.
She reached that stage just once in 2023, and last year was shocked in just the third round by Yulia Putintseva despite being the number one seed.
With a philosophy that does not favour grass, it’s hard to completely transform your game around such a short part of the schedule.
However, with shrewd changes clearly there to be made, as Roddick alludes to, perhaps this could be the year where the Polish superstar actually surprises everyone to get her year back on track.
