Tears instead of triumph: Coco Gauff missed her greatest success at the French Open in a tournament that is shaped by outsiders.
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–Broken racket, broken dreams: Coco Gauff
Foto: Clive Brunskill (Getty Images)
She is considered the princess of tennis, the designated queen, but the path to the throne has never been easy. This is also the experience of Cori «Coco» Gauff, the precocious American talent, das Already close to the top 10 at the age of 17. Instead of a triumph, the French Open ended for her in the quarter-finals with tears and a bitter, because less compelling defeat.
The refreshing and carefree American from Delray Beach had won the preparatory tournament in Parma and reached her first Grand Slam quarter-final at the French Open convincing. In this one she faced a bad winner, the 25-year-old Czech Barbora Krejcikova (WTA 33). It started with a quick 3-0, but then things got complicated. Gauff, the youngest quarter-finalist in Paris for 15 years, missed set ball after set ball, a total of five, and lost the decisive starting set in the tie-break.
She screams she’s no longer hitting a ball
Gauff would have advanced from 25th to 10th place with a tournament victory in Paris. D.oh then came what was foreseeable. You could dDon’t put away the unhappily lost starting sentence, her head was down, her body language was negative, in between she screamed that she wasn’t hitting a ball anymore. And then she fell back into her old mistakes, made double faults again, and at 6: 7, 0: 4 she destroyed a club and was cautioned. She was able to fend off five match points, the sixth was too many.
–“I’ve never dreamed of such a success”: Barbora Krejcikova was previously known primarily as a dual specialist.
Foto: Ian Langsdon (Keystone)
Gauff is the only 17-year-old who is already among the top 300 in the world rankings, and the hymns of praise are ahead of her. Tony Godsick, who also looks after Roger Federer, said two years ago when he was with his and Federer’s agency team 8 signed: “There are few iconic female athletes in the world. And the most famous and most successful of them off the field were always tennis players. She’ll be next, and she has the powerwithial to be the next. “
Was there Gauff full of hopes for the game grose. “I’ve learned that you have to be patient on sand, wait for the right chance to attack,” she said. The times when teenagers won Grand Slam titles in a row – Martina Hingis, Monica Seles and Tracy Austin made it before their 17th birthday – are but stop past. Coco Gauff stays neverthelessem eother the greatest aspirants to the throne in women’s tennis – and them hat plus all the time in the world. Krejcikova consoled her: “I am sure she will achieve great successes in the future”.
The Czech is now waiting for the winners of the last quarter-finals, between the Greek Maria Sakkari and the Polish defending champion Iga Swiatek. Had already on Tuesday the Russian Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova (WTA 32) and the Slovenian Tamara Zidansek (WTA 85) reached the semi-finals.
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