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Coco Gauff Shares That She Has 'Work to Do' After Australian Open Quarterfinals Loss

The American tennis star fell to Paula Badosa in two sets on Tuesday.

Madison Williams

Coco Gauff celebrates a point at the Australian Open.
Coco Gauff celebrates a point at the Australian Open. / Mike Frey-Imagn Images

World No. 3 Coco Gauff lost unexpectedly to Paula Badosa 7-5, 6-4 in the quarterfinals of the Australian Open on Tuesday.

Gauff was definitely expected to make it to the semifinals, and she even had some of the best odds to capture the Australian Open title. However, the 20-year-old's 41 unforced errors didn't help as she fell to the World No. 11.

After the match, Gauff was candid about her performance and how she's going to reflect on her loss in order to prepare for the future.

“Just a lot more work to do,” Gauff said. “I’m obviously disappointed, but I’m not completely crushed.”

Gauff went on to explain what she specifically plans to work on after her elimination. She remained positive even following the loss.

“I feel like (at the) U.S. Open, I was playing with no solution, so that was more the frustrating part. Today, I feel like I’m playing with solutions; I know what I need to work on," Gauff said. "U.S. Open, I needed to work on my serve. Not saying that my serve is where I want it to be, but I worked on it; obviously, a big improvement. So I want to continue working on that, continue working on playing aggressive. ... So I feel like I’m on the road to the right way, right path. Even though I lost today, I feel like I’m in an upward trajectory.”

The next known tournament for Gauff is the Qatar Open in February. She has a few months before the start of the second major of the season, the French Open, where she has her best win percentage in all the majors at 80%. She reached the semifinals last year, so we'll see if she can finally capture the coveted clay title this season.

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Madison Williams
MADISON WILLIAMS

Madison Williams is a staff writer on the Breaking and Trending News team at Sports Illustrated, where she specializes in tennis but covers a wide range of sports from a national perspective. Before joining SI in 2022, Williams worked at The Sporting News. Having graduated from Augustana College, she completed a master’s in sports media at Northwestern University. She is a dog mom and an avid reader.

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