Iga Swiatek reached her first Wimbledon final after defeating Belinda Benčić 6-2, 6-0 in about an hour and 10 minutes of play.

Swiatek, the eighth seed, traditionally has problems on grass, having only made one quarter-final appearance in London in 2023. Since the start of this year's edition, however, she has demonstrated that she came with a mission to become a champion and proved this with her performance in the semi-final, in which she gave up only two games to the former Olympic champion from Switzerland. Benčić was broken five times and simply could not cope with the classier opponent, after yesterday she put serious effort to defeat Mirra Andreeva in two tiebreak sets. The 35th in the world rankings had two chances to break Swiatek throughout the match, but both were wasted, and ultimately she didn't win a single game in the second set.

Thus, the fourth racket of the world, Swiatek, will fight for a sixth Grand Slam title and a first at Wimbledon - she has four at Roland Garros (2020, 2022-24) and one at the US Open (2022). Bencic, for her part, remains with two Slam semifinals - the first was achieved in New York in 2019.

On Saturday, Swiatek, who played semifinals in Melbourne and Paris earlier this season, will face Amanda Anisimova in the final. The American beat world number 1 Aryna Sabalenka in three sets. Thus, Swiatek and Sabalenka again missed out on a possible Slam final between them. | BGNES