Fifth seed Elena Rybakina booked her place in the Australian Open semi-finals on Wednesday with a dominant second-set performance to hand six-time Grand Slam champion Iga Swiatek a 7-5 6-1 defeat at Melbourne Park.
Looking to lift the trophy for the first time, the 28-year-old will face American Jessica Pegula for a place in Saturday’s final.
Rybakina fired 11 aces and 26 winners as she ended Swiatek’s career Grand Slam on Rod Laver Arena, winning eight of the final nine matches to underline her authority.
“Really happy with this victory,” Rybakina said. “We know each other pretty well and I was just trying to stay aggressive.
“I feel like in the first set, for both of us, the first serve didn’t work, so we tried to step in on the second serve to put pressure on each other.
“I think in the second I started playing more freely, serving better and I’m really happy with the victory.”
Swiatek got off to a fast start, breaking Rybakina in the first game as she punished the Kazakh’s second serve, but the number two seed failed to consolidate, immediately ceding her advantage.
Both players held serve until the final game, when Swiatek fired into the net to give Rybakina the first set after nearly an hour of play.
Rybakina then took advantage of Swiatek’s frustrations with her serve, winning the second game of the second set by firing a forehand into the corner with the Pole firmly rooted in place.
Swiatek had to question a marginal line call as Rybakina broke her serve again late in the set before holding comfortably to advance.
Swiatek struggled with her serve throughout the competition and the world number two said it was something she needed to improve on in the coming months.
“I didn’t serve as well as in Cincinnati, for example, against Elena. My serve was pretty normal and sometimes he could have given me a little more,” Swiatek told reporters.
“There are certain things in the serve that I want to change and I already changed it in pre-season. But then the matches come and you don’t have much time to think about it.
“You don’t want to think about those details when you’re playing. So we go back to the old patterns… There are things I can change to play better and I will try to do so. she said.
