Iga Swiatek escapes Alexandra Eala in Madrid second round

Iga Swiatek avoided another stunning loss to Alexandra Eala at a WTA 1000 event with a three-set comeback in the second round of the Mutua Madrid Open on Thursday, with the No. 2 seed and defending champion rallying from a set and a break deficit to win 4-6, 6-4, 6-2.

The first hour of the match looked like a carbon-copy of Eala's 6-2, 7-5 upset of Swiatek in the quarterfinals of the Miami Open last month, in which the former junior US Open champion announced her arrival at tour level. Swiatek racked up 25 unforced errors in the first set, and lost serve four times en route to trailing Eala 6-4, 3-2. But the world No. 2, defending 4000 ranking points in the coming weeks after winning Madrid, Rome and Roland Garros last year, cleaned up her tennis and found her way through a pulsating comeback in two hours and 15 minutes.

"It wasn't easy to get into the rhythm and feel the right timing, so I'm happy that I was just patient," Swiatek confessed post-match after making 57 unforced errors. She finished with 40 winners, 29 of which came in sets two and three. At one stage early in the second set, Eala had won two-thirds of her points off of Swiatek's mistakes.

Swiatek escaped her earliest loss at any WTA 1000 event, on any surface, in nearly four years with the three-set win, her first in a deciding set since she topped Linda Noskova from a set behind in the third round of the Qatar Total Open in February. She last lost in the second round at the 2021 Cincinnati Open.

Swiatek will face Noskova again in her next match in Madrid, seeking to beat the Czech for a fourth straight time since losing to her in the third round of the 2024 Australian Open.