Coco Gauff survived a massive scare to reach the fourth round of the Italian Open, but clearly wasn’t happy with her performance. The third seed stormed back to beat Solana Sierra 5-7 6-0 6-4, coming back from a double-break down in the decider. But tensions boiled over in the opening set when Gauff hit her own head after getting broken at 5-5, and smashed her racket on her head again after losing it 7-5.
Last year’s runner-up was able to regroup, racing through the second set in half an hour and bagelling Sierra, but found herself in trouble in the final set when the world No. 72 took a 3-0 lead, breaking Gauff twice.
The American came storming back again, winning five games on the bounce and giving herself the opportunity to serve for the match. But she still didn’t look pleased.
“Even though Gauff is starting to play better, she still looks quite unhappy with herself, regardless of winning the second set 6-0 and winning four games in a row in this final set,” commentator and British tennis player Eden Silva said as the No. 3 seed started mounting her comeback in the third set.
Mark Valledy replied: “I think you hit the nail on the head, that’s what it is, I think she’s unhappy with her level. Such a perfectionist, you imagine, to reach this sort of standard. The manner in which that first set got away from her, she never really got over it. If she gets through this match, there will be a big debrief after this.”
The rollercoaster continued. Gauff couldn’t convert a match point on her serve at 5-3, and was then broken. But she immediately broke in the next game to claim victory, with Sierra giving the match away on a double fault.
The 22-year-old still didn’t look happy as she approached the net for the handshake and then waved to the crowd after reaching the last 16. “In no means is she going to be happy with her performance, or maybe her body language in that match,” Silva added.
“Today, it looked like she didn’t want to lose more than she wanted to win, that was sort of what she was behaving like on court, and you could see it was so visual. But we’ve said so often, they don’t put how you’ve won next to your name; it’s just a win. So she lives to fight another day.”
Gauff is guaranteed to face a fellow American in her next match, as she awaits the winner of a third-round contest between 16th seed Iva Jovic and qualifier Taylor Townsend. But the former finalist has work to do after looking unhappy with her level throughout Saturday’s match.