According to Kim Clijsters, Iga Swiatek has an open mindset to learn and absorb from all the great players around the Tour.
Swiatek underwent a major change in the past year emerging as the undisputed number one in women's tennis. It's quite a stark contrast to the player we saw at the WTA Finals in 2021 when she was spotted crying on the court struggling to keep going in a match against Sakkari.
Swiatek admitted after the match that she was disappointed after not performing as well as she hoped and this year we saw a player who played with machine-like precision. On the transformation, Clijsters said:
"This year and the last few years, I've loved watching her [Iga Swiatek] grow, not just on the tennis court, but mentally as well. Just the way that she's able to improve her game. She has such an open mindset to learn and absorb from all the greats that walk around at the Grand Slams, from coaches. She listens to commentators, she picks up so many things and is able to absorb it better than anyone I've seen on the women's tour.
She added:
"You can tell that she was able to win a lot of tournaments when she was younger because she was able to bring so many balls back than the other girls as she was so much more consistent. But what she's been able to do is take control of the offensive part of the game and she's been able to really learn how to do that. That's something that's really hard to do when your nature is to be a bit more defensive and to rely on your movement."