The biggest head-to-head rivalries in women's tennis - ESPN

Aryna Sabalenka and Iga Swiatek have dominated the WTA Tour for the past few years, winning nine of the past 15 Grand Slams between them.

But when the draw for the women's singles at the Australian Open was made last week, both Sabalenka and Swiatek might have breathed a sigh of relief.

That's because they were drawn in opposite halves to two players who have made their lives difficult in the past. For Sabalenka, it's Amanda Anisimova; for Swiatek, it's Coco Gauff.

Swiatek leads Gauff 11-5, but the American has won their past four meetings, all in straight sets. Anisimova leads Sabalenka 6-5, although the Belarusian has won three of the past four.

Head-to-head records are important in tennis; the one-on-one nature of the sport means that when one player has the wool over another, they often continue to beat them, even if their opponent is ranked higher or has been in better form.

«In the past I used to think about it so much because you want to get the one win,» Gauff said Monday at the Australian Open. «I think once I got that… I erased the other matches.

»Obviously, [Swiatek] is a great player, and she deserved those wins, but I felt like a lot of those — some of those losses, I won't say a lot, because she just outplayed me, but some of them, at least at the beginning, it just was already on the mental deficit. I think once I erased that mental deficit, I was able to play free."

Gauff said Swiatek was the only player who made her feel that way. Winning one match was liberating. «There was no other head-to-head in tennis where I had that, so it was very difficult to navigate,» she said. «Now I feel like I'm able to play free. Obviously, it's still a big gap in the head-to-head. I just erase it from my mind. Can't