LONDON — No. 1 women’s seed Iga Swiatek of Poland kept her Wimbledon campaign on track, defeating Croatia’s Petra Martic 6-2, 7-5 on Friday to reach the Round of 16 without dropping a set.
Service breaks were traded early in the first set before Swiatek, 22, reeled off four games in a row and was relatively untroubled the rest of the way as she matched her best run at the All England Club.
She will face Switzerland’s Belinda Bencic, a 6-3, 6-1 winner over Poland’s Magda Linette, next.
Martic, seeded 30th, had managed to win just seven games in two previous meetings with Swiatek, but doubled that total after she saved a match point at 3-5 before breaking Swiatek’s serve.
Martic led 40-0 on her own serve with a chance to take a 6-5 lead, but Swiatek recovered to break and wrapped up the victory in the next game as Martic bungled a dropshot into the net.
“I’m happy I could close it out at the end of the second set,” Swiatek, who has been ranked No. 1 for 67 consecutive weeks, said on court.
Referring to her next opponent, the 14th-seeded Bencic, Swiatek said, “Belinda is playing a great game and it’s never going to be easy in the fourth round of a slam.”
In other results on the women’s side, No. 4 seed Jessica Pegula moved into the fourth round with a 6-4, 6-0 victory over Italy’s Elisabetta Cocciaretto, and 2022 Wimbledon runner-up Ons Jabeur secured her spot in the third round.
Also advancing to the Round of 16 on Friday were Victoria Azarenka, Lesia Tsurenko, Marketa Vondrousova and Elina Svitolina.
The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.
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