19-year-old Coco Gauff came from behind to defeat her Belarusian opponent Aryna Sabalenka 2-6, 6-3, 6-2 on Saturday. The match was played in front of a sell-out crowd of 28,143 at Arthur Ashe Stadium, the same venue where she had watched her idols, the William sisters, play years earlier.
Paying homage to her idols after the victory, Gauff said, “They have allowed me to believe in this dream growing up. You know, there wasn’t too many just Black tennis players dominating the sport. It was literally just them that I can remember when I was younger…Obviously more came because of their legacy. So it made the dream more believable. But all the things that they had to go through, they made it easier for someone like me to do this.”
Gauff, who is on a career-best 12-match winning streak also thanked the people who doubted her talent, noting “Tried my best to carry this with grace, and I’ve been doing my best, so honestly, to those who thought they were putting water in my fire: You were really adding gas to it and now it’s really burning so bright right now.”
The 19-year-old is the first American teenager to win the US Open since Serena Williams achieved the feat in 1999. It was also the 50th anniversary of the tournament, one of the only major sports to pay men and women equally.
Gauff had become the youngest qualifier in Wimbledon history, making it to the fourth round during her Grand Slam debut in 2019. After a shattering loss during last year’s French Open, Gauff has come back strongly to win the titles in Washington and Cincinnati.
(With inputs from AP, AFP)
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Updated: 10 Sep 2023, 07:33 AM IST
