Can Iga Swiatek Overcome Challenging Field at Korea Open?

After winning Wimbledon, Iga Swiatek followed up with a strong showing in the North American Hard Court swing of the WTA season. She won the Cincinnati Masters before running into a red-hot Amanda Anisimova in the US Open quarterfinals.

Almost two weeks after her loss to Anisimova, Swiatek enters the Korea Open Tennis Championships (WTA 500 Seoul) as the top seed. On Saturday, tournament organizers unveiled the draw, and it looks challenging for every player, including Swiatek.

The silver lining is that Swiatek has almost no points to defend as she begins the Asia Swing of the schedule. Below is a round-by-round breakdown of Swiatek's challenging path to victory.

As a seeded player, Swiatek gets a bye in the first round. From there, she will face either Lin Zhu or Sorana Cirstea in the second round.

Swiatek's competition immediately gets tough when she will face either five-seed Barbora Krejcikova, eight-seed Emma Raducanu, or Jaqueline Cristian in the quarterfinals.

Should Swiatek advance to the semifinals, she could face either three-seed Clara Tauson, seven-seed Sofia Kenin, Laura Siegemund, Maya Joint, or Eva Lys.

Should Swiatek make it through her side of the bracket, the final could be a matchup against two-seed Ekaterina Alexandrova, four-seed Daria Kasatkina, five-seed Diana Shnaider, or the six-seed defending champion Beatriz Haddad Maia.

Currently, Swiatek is the World No.2 with a singles record of 53-13 and two titles. After a challenging first half of the season, the Polish superstar has turned it around over the past few months and is looking to finish the season strong.

The Korea Open runs from September 15-21. Stay locked into Sports Illustrated's Serve On SI for all of your tennis news from the court and beyond.

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