On a blistering hot Wednesday at Roland Garros, two of the women’s draw’s top contenders delivered dominant performances to punch their tickets to the 2025 French Open third round, with all eyes turning next to Novak Djokovic’s highly anticipated second-round clash against a French wildcard.
Four-time tournament champion Iga Swiatek, the third seed from Poland, overcame a fecy challenge from rising Czech teenager Sara Bejlek to seal a 6-2, 6-3 victory on Court Philippe Chatrier, extending her unbroken streak of reaching at least the second week at the clay-court Grand Slam. Playing her first major tournament since pairing up with Francisco Roig, the long-time former coach of 14-time Roland Garros champion Rafael Nadal, Swiatek has entered the tournament as one of the favorites to claim a seventh Grand Slam singles title, after a strong run to the Italian Open semi-finals earlier this month. She is now eyeing a return to the trophy she last lifted in 2024, but her next match could bring her toughest test yet: she will face the winner of the match between 2017 champion Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia and Polish compatriot Magda Linette, and Ostapenko holds a perfect 6-0 head-to-head record over Swiatek.
Speaking after her 93-minute victory in soaring Paris temperatures, Swiatek noted the unusual early-tournament heat, saying, “Usually the weather is quite different here, but it doesn’t matter. It’s going to change, I feel, in the second part of the tournament. So I guess this tournament is really about whoever will cope with both of these conditions will win.”
Joining Swiatek in the third round is Ukrainian seventh seed Elina Svitolina, who continued her red-hot form following her Italian Open title earlier this month with a 6-0, 6-4 win over world No. 126 Kaitlin Quevedo. Svitolina, who upset Swiatek on her way to lifting the Rome trophy — her first WTA 1000 title in eight years — endured a dramatic first-round scare earlier in the week, squeezing past Hungary’s Anna Bondar in a deciding-set tiebreaker just hours before watching her husband Gael Monfils play the final match of his Roland Garros career. On Wednesday, however, she was in complete control from the opening game, wrapping up the win after breaking Quevedo in the ninth game of the second set. Svitolina, who reached the Australian Open semi-finals earlier this year, will next face 31-year-old German Tamara Korpatsch, who booked her first ever Grand Slam third-round spot after defeating China’s 32nd seed Wang Xinyu.
Other women’s singles results on Wednesday saw former Olympic gold medalist Belinda Bencic breeze into the round of 32 for the third time in her career, dropping just four games in a 6-4, 6-0 win over American Caty McNally.
All attention now shifts to Djokovic’s afternoon centre court clash against 74th-ranked French wildcard Valentin Royer. The 39-year-old Serbian, who is chasing a historic 25th Grand Slam singles title, was forced to come from a set down to defeat another French young gun, Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard, in his opening round on Sunday night. This time, he will face Royer in the hottest part of the day, and Djokovic acknowledged ahead of the match that facing a home competitor on centre court brings added pressure. “Obviously playing a French player, centre court, Roland Garros, is never so easy, you know. Obviously the crowd gets into it, and then you feel the pressure even more,” he said after his opening win.
In other men’s draw action on Wednesday, Russian 13th seed Karen Khachanov outlasted Marco Trungelliti in a four-set grueller, sealing a 7-6(7/5), 5-7, 6-1, 7-6(7/4) victory to advance. He will face Dutch lucky loser Jesper de Jong, who followed up his opening-round upset of Stan Wawrinka with a win over Federico Cina, for a spot in the round of 16 on Friday.
Two-time French Open finalist Casper Ruud, who described himself as “like a zombie” after his five-set opening-round marathon played out in the scorching sun, will return to court later Wednesday against Serbian Hamad Medjedovic, with the Norwegian desperate for a far shorter outing to conserve energy amid continuing high temperatures. Other top names set for second-round action on Wednesday include Kazakh world No. 2 Elena Rybakina, who is chasing her second Grand Slam title of the season, as she faces Ukrainian Yuliia Starodubtseva on Court Suzanne Lenglen. A crop of exciting teenage prospects, including Mirra Andreeva, Rafael Jodar and Joao Fonseca, will also play their second-round matches later in the day.