US Open 2024: Coco Gauff starts title defense with easy win

NEW YORK (AP) — The mantra rang out in cavernous Arthur Ashe Stadium on Monday on the U.S. Open earlier than Coco Gauff’s first service sport of her first match of her first Grand Slam event as a defending champion: “Right here we go, Coco! Right here we go!”

Coming to Flushing Meadows off a collection of early exits at different occasions, Gauff already was down 1-0 to Varvara Gracheva, having dropped the match’s preliminary sport at love by making 4 groundstroke errors. What adopted was a tricky, tight sport, that includes 14 factors throughout eight minutes and three break possibilities for Gracheva.

The necessary half, after all, was that Gauff saved all of these break factors, claimed that sport, and all of the sudden was in full management on the best way to a 6-2, 6-0 victory that not solely put the 20-year-old American within the second spherical but in addition informed her — and everybody else — that her sport is in higher form than it appeared recently.

“The final couple of weeks have been robust, and I used to be like, ‘I’ve to do that and do this, however I don’t must show something to anybody besides myself.’ So … (these) two weeks are nearly proving all of the expectations that I’ve on myself,” the No. 3-seeded Gauff stated. “I’ve many extra years coming again right here and I’m not going to win yearly. Simply that perspective and simply having the idea that I can — however not the expectation that I ought to.”

Day 1 on the 12 months’s final Grand Slam event went about in addition to potential for Gauff and one other younger American featured in Ashe, Thirteenth-seeded Ben Shelton, a semifinalist a 12 months in the past who beat 2020 champion Dominic Thiem 6-4, 6-2, 6-2. It was the final U.S. Open match for Thiem, who turns 31 subsequent week and is retiring after this season.

“Clearly she performs with lots of ardour,” Shelton, 21, stated about Gauff. “You can inform that she cares on the market. She’s into it each time that she’s on the court docket. I believe that’s one thing that the folks love.”

Gauff was not the one previous U.S. Open champ on Monday’s schedule: The evening session in Ashe started with 2017 winner Sloane Stephens blowing an enormous lead towards Clara Burel and dropping 0-6, 7-5, 7-5 after taking the primary 9 video games, adopted by Novak Djokovic — whose assortment of 24 Slam titles contains final 12 months’s in New York — getting previous Radu Albot 6-2, 6-2, 6-4.

Seeded ladies’s winners included No. 2 Aryna Sabalenka, the two-time Australian Open champion who was the runner-up to Gauff a 12 months in the past in New York; No. 7 Zheng Qinwen, the ladies’s gold medalist on the Paris Olympics earlier this month; No. 24 Donna Vekic, the silver medalist; No. 12 Daria Kasatkina; and No. 14 Madison Keys.

No. 9 Maria Sakkari stopped enjoying after one set due to an injured proper shoulder. The best-seeded man out of the bracket throughout the day session was No. 15 Holger Rune, who was eradicated by Brandon Nakashima of the U.S. 6-2, 6-1, 6-4.

Among the many males’s seeds advancing have been No. 4 Alexander Zverev, the runner-up to Thiem 4 years in the past; No. 6 Andrey Rublev; No. 8 Casper Ruud, the 2022 runner-up at Flushing Meadows; No. 9 Grigor Dimitrov; and No. 12 Taylor Fritz.

Zheng is having fun with a breakthrough season that started with a run to the ultimate on the Australian Open in January and reached a peak when she claimed China’s first Summer time Video games singles gold. Monday was tough on the outset towards 2019 French Open semifinalist Amanda Anisimova, however Zheng finally got here again to win 4-6, 6-4, 6-2.

“Every part begins at zero. You aren’t anymore the Olympic champion,” Zheng stated. “Simply be humble and attempt to work, combat each single match, as a result of if you happen to don’t combat, you could have a giant likelihood to lose.”

That mirrors Gauff’s method as she returns to the location of her best triumph thus far.

If she was attempting to start out from scratch after early exits in three occasions on the Paris Video games — not that she desires to overlook about that journey to France; Gauff wore a necklace with the Olympic rings throughout Monday’s match — adopted by a two-match skid on North American arduous courts, Gauff did a superb job of it.

This wasn’t shocking to Gauff. In no way. She knew she didn’t play nice in Toronto or Cincinnati in current weeks. However she additionally might inform she was hitting balls properly in apply.

“Normally that first spherical for me can generally set the tone for a event, whether or not you’re enjoying properly or not. … I had a superb mentality. Is that this going to say I’m going to play nice the subsequent couple matches? Sure or no,” Gauff stated. “However I believe the mentality I’ve going into this week will probably be there, and hopefully the execution stays there.”

She solely wanted 66 minutes to win Monday, utilizing a few of her 10 aces to assist erase all eight break factors Gracheva amassed, and compiling a 16-5 edge in winners.

“From the beginning, we type of all knew that Coco was going to be an incredible participant, and she or he’s extremely mature and carries herself in a approach that I want that I carried myself once I was her age,” stated Keys, 29, who misplaced to Stephens within the U.S. Open last seven years in the past. “It’s additionally very spectacular how she’s been ready … by way of the entire strain and the entire expectation that’s been placed on her, proceed to do in addition to she has.”

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AP tennis: https://apnews.com/hub/tennis