LONDON (AP) — Coco Gauff became just the third woman in the Open era to lose in the first round at Wimbledon right after winning the championship at the French Open, eliminated 7-6 (3), 6-1 by unseeded Dayana Yastremska of Ukraine on Tuesday night.
The No. 2-ranked Gauff made mistake after mistake at No. 1 Court, finishing with just six winners and a total of 29 unforced errors that included nine double-faults.
“Dayana started off playing strong,” Gauff said. “I couldn’t find my footing out there today.”
She joined another highly seeded American, No. 3 Jessica Pegula, in bowing out on Day 2 of the tournament. In all, 23 seeds — 13 men and 10 women — already are gone before the first round is even done, tying the most at any Grand Slam tournament since they began seeding 32 players in each singles bracket in 2001.
It was just a little more than three weeks ago that Gauff was celebrating her second Grand Slam title by getting past No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka in the final on the red clay of Roland-Garros.
The quick turnaround might have been an issue, Gauff acknowledged.
“I feel like mentally I was a little bit overwhelmed with everything that came afterwards,” said the 21-year-old Gauff, “so I didn’t feel like I had enough time to celebrate and also get back into it.”
She didn't think it mattered Tuesday that their match location was shifted from Centre Court to Court No. 1 or that she was told about a new start time only about an hour before the contest began.
Even though Gauff’s big breakthrough came at the All England Club at age 15 in 2019, when she beat Venus Williams in her opening match and made it all the way to the fourth round, the grass-court tournament has proved to be her least-successful major.
It’s the only Slam where Gauff hasn’t made at least the semifinals.
Indeed, she has yet to get past the fourth round and now has been sent home in the first round twice in the past three years.
The transition from clay to grass has proven tough for most players, and the last woman to win the French Open and Wimbledon in the same season was Serena Williams a decade ago.
Still, since the Open era began in 1968, only Justine Henin in 2005 and Francesca Schiavone in 2010 went from holding the trophy in Paris to exiting immediately in London.
Gauff was never quite at her best Tuesday against Yastremska, who had lost all three of their previous matchups and currently is ranked 42nd.
A particular problem for Gauff, as it often is, was her serving. She managed to put only 45% of her first serves in play, won 14 of her 32 second-serve points and had all of those double-faults, including a pair in the tiebreaker and another when she got broken to open the second set.
“When I can serve well, and some games I did, it’s definitely an added threat,” Gauff said. “I didn’t serve that well."
Yastremska’s best Grand Slam result was making it all the way to the semifinals on the Australian Open’s hard courts last year, although she entered this event with a record of only 10-11 in first-round matches at majors.
Gauff, by contrast, was 20-3 at that stage, including a loss to Sofia Kenin at Wimbledon in 2023.
Yastremska's deepest run at Wimbledon was making the fourth round in 2019, although she did get to the final of the junior event in 2016.
“I was really on fire,” said Yastremska, who accumulated 16 winners. “Playing against Coco, it is something special.”
She recently reached her first tournament final on grass, at a smaller event in Nottingham, which she said gave her confidence heading to the All England Club.
“I love playing on grass. I feel that this year we are kind of friends,” Yastremska said with a laugh. “I hope the road will continue for me here.”
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Howard Fendrich, The Associated Press
