Birthday girl Iga Swiatek celebrates by easing past Bouzkova as Ons Jabeur impresses

Iga Swiatek has celebrated her birthday with her latest win at the 2024 French Open and it wasn't as difficult as her last victory over Naomi Osaka as she sailed through in two sets 6-4, 6-2 against Marie Bouzkova to sail into the fourth round.

Swiatek who no doubt will celebrate this evening as she heads towards the second week of action at the 2024 French Open sealed the win in just over an hour and a half. Next up is Anastasia Potapova who saw off Xinyu Wang in three sets earlier today. The Russian won in just under three hours 7-5, 6-7, 6-4 and will be the one tasked to likely topple Swiatek. This especially being the case with Olga Danilovic being the cork in the bottle.

The Serbian dumped out Danielle Collins yesterday and reached the fourth round today seeing off Donna Vekic. Collins was expected to be the one to face Swiatek in the Quarter-Finals. But with her loss, it certainly has opened up for the Pole to surge towards the latter stages. She is in pursuit of a fourth title this week in Paris.

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Swiatek led from the very beginning against Bouzkova who is a tough task on paper. But she couldn't threaten the resolve of the Queen of Clay. She went 3-1 and 4-2 up before looking like she was going to the brink of the opening set. But Bouzkova prolonged it. She broke Swiatek to make it 5-3 and kept pace until the World No.1 served it out.

The second was a more pedestrian affair as Swiatek breezed 4-0 up including breaking twice on the spin to set her well on the way. She finally saw Bouzkova hold serve albeit under severe pressure. But she still went 5-1 up. Only for Swiatek to spurn the chance to win 5-1. In the end though on her fourth match point, she claimed the win.

Over on Court Suzanne-Lenglen, Ons Jabeur plotted her route just before Swiatek. She sealed a hard fought win over Leylah Fernandez on Friday. It was a 6-4, 7-6(5) win for the Tunisian over the 31st seed. She took one hour and 53 minutes to fend off the former US Open finalist.

She saved a set point at 5-4 in the second set. It was Jabeur's fourth win in their four meetings priorly. After losing six of her first eight matches in 2024, there are green shoots for Jabeur. In Madrid in particular, she impressed as she reached the Quarter-Finals including winning over Fernandez. She has brought that onto Paris. A player for the big stage, she has tended to pick it up during Grand Slams.

It is only a great sign too going into her favourite surface of grass in terms of her record so far. Albeit she is not done yet, she was utterly superb in her court craft against Fernandez with 14 passing winners to Fernandez' four in the tie. Fernandez led throughout in the second set, but Jabeur found her top form when she needed it most with glimmers of quality proving to be vital.

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A sweet birthday victory 🥳 #RolandGarros

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