Gauff advances with three-set win, will face defending champ
MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA » Showing so much poise for a 15-year-old, Coco Gauff kept digging herself out of deficits Wednesday (Australia time) and eventually prevailed to reach the Australian Open’s third round, setting up yet another Grand Slam showdown against Naomi Osaka.
Less than five months after their memorable meeting at the U.S. Open — Osaka won that one in straight sets, then consoled a crying Gauff and encouraged her to address the crowd — the two will meet again. Like that time, Osaka is the major’s reigning champion and Gauff is making her debut at the tournament.
“I know what to expect,” Gauff said. “I’m excited for a good match.”
She was not at her very best against Sorana Cirstea but managed to figure her way out of trouble, over and over and over again, to produce a 4-6, 6-3, 7-5 win over more than two hours.
Gauff dropped the first set. After forcing things to a third, she trailed by a break at 3-0. Even after getting back to 3-all, Gauff needed to get through one more gut-check: Twice, she was two points from losing.
But the American teenager broke in the next-to-last game, then held to win and showed the sort of emotion she had for much of the match, leaning forward and pumping her fist.
Osaka worked through some frustrations by grabbing her racket with both hands and chucking it to the ground, tossing away a tennis ball and then kicking that racket, to boot. Then she gathered herself and defeated Zheng Saisai 6-2, 6-4.
• Caroline Wozniacki continued her farewell tournament by overcoming a 5-1 first-set deficit and beating Dayana Yastremska 7-5, 7-5 on her sixth match point in the second round.
Wozniacki has said she plans to retire after this Australian Open. The 2018 champion had three match points in the 10th game of the second set, but Yastremska held in a game after she’d taken a medical timeout to treat her left leg.
• Atherton’s Cici Bellis won a Grand Slam match for the first time in nearly three years after having a series of operations. The 20-year-old, once ranked as high as 35th, moved into the second round by beating Tatjana Maria of Germany 6-0, 6-2.
Bellis was sidelined for about 20 months because she needed surgery on her right wrist or arm a total of four times. Her last victory at a major tournament came when she got to the French Open’s third round in 2017.
• John Isner’s Australian Open losing streak is over. In what can best be described as a fairly typical Isner match — the two players combined for 48 service games and zero breaks — the 19th-seeded American moved into the second round by edging Thiago Monteiro of Brazil 6-7 (5), 7-6 (4), 7-6 (7), 7-6 (5).
Here’s how close it was: Isner and Monteiro each won exactly 157 points.
• Rafael Nadal had a 6-2, 6-3, 6-0 win over Hugo Dellien in his first competitive match back on Rod Laver Arena since losing the Australian Open final to Novak Djokovic last year.
The top-ranked Nadal is chasing his 20th major singles title, aiming to equal Roger Federer’s men’s record. He’s also aiming to complete a collection by winning each of the four Grand Slam titles at least twice.