Coco Came, Coco Saw, And Coco Is Going To Conquer

Scoop – even allowing for your tendency to hyperbole, I think you’re wrong. Cirstea was a very moderate opponent.

And where’s Serena in this Gauff scenario ? Forgotten already ?

Well, everyone else better just pack up their racquets and go home if this is the future. Or maybe I’ve just been around too long.

I have no problem with Gauff saying she wants to be the greatest ever since she was age 10. Good for her, be confident.

Reality is the female tennis world has changed drastically over the past 20 years. Girls are doing more physical training, have nutritional counselors, bigger, stronger, better trained, all over the world, The depth of competition is getting deeper each year, the matches more physical.

The days of a dominant WTA player are gone. Winning 1-2 majors will be a great career…..3 and you will be legend.

Ugh. Much ado about a kid. She’s good. Game’s got issues. Growing up in public spotlight. It’s going to be painful. Her family has and will make mistakes especially on the PR side and especially with a microphone anywhere near, and as promising as these pretty impressive wins are the sport has seen a lot of this in its history. I like Gauff and wish her the best. But beating Cirstea isn’t the kind of earth-shattering win but there’s so much desperation in the U.S. for another champion that sadly we take wins where we get them.

So good job kid, Round Three! I mean, it’s as if she’s already won the tournament. Gimme a break. She’s an excellent talent.

There you go welcome to the never ending USA hype machine. And I say this as a fan of US players.

catherine, my point was that no one will win 23 or 15 or even 7 slams ever again. They will come and go. That is what has changed in the WTA, no more dominant players.

Once Serena, Venus, Pova retire what active player has more than 2-3 career slams?

As far as Gauff, I agree, nothing different about her game. She plays the same as any of them for the most part. As far as competitors, Kenin and others are fierce fighters too, they just do not yell about it.

And yes, Gauff’s forehand grip is limiting. Cristea have her all topspin to her forehand, or even worse, sitters for Gauff to step in with her backhand. But give her hard pace or lower, flatter balls to the forehand, it breaks down.

I wish Stan Lee was still alive to make a Marvel movie about Co Co.

By the way, the highlight of the night last night was when Osaka got 3-4 slices in a row, lost the point, then turned to her box and said “What the f@ck is this?” while pointing to her opponent.

Jon,,

Really, 7 slams you think is out of the picture for Andreescu, Osake or Gauff. I’ll take the bet right now at least one or two of these players will win at least 7 slams. Osaka has two already. Serena’s the reason no other woman has won seven slams in the past ten years. But come on, Gauff is freakin’ good. I don’t give two hoots about her forehand grip. Champions know how to get past deficiencies in their technique. Heck, Nadal used to hit his forehand on his back foot all time. That didn’t affect him.

I’d take the bet two out of these three players will win 7 or more slams. Do you know how many slams Coco is going to play? At least 60, I like her chances to win 7 of those.

That’s a lot of slams for someone with none now, or players with 1-2 now. They aren’t handing out slams for free these days.

It gets more physical every year. The money gets bigger for winning just one slam. Social media gets more fierce.

The odds of any single player staying healthy, motivated, and not having the next crop of Clervie’s or whoever else will come along to challenge them….and winning 7 times. Seems pretty slim to me.

Remember there are always more in the pipeline that we have not heard of yet. Over the next 2 years, 3 years, 4 years, 5 years….another 2-3-4 Biancas or Osakas or Ovas will come along.

The currents will fade and be replaced by new shiny objects who are hungry with less wear and tear physically and mentally, long before they reach 7 slamds

Scoop, Coco isn’t the only player who has said she wants to be the best. Bianca said it as well. More quietly than Coco, perhaps, but it’s out there. After her USO title Bianca said of Serena: “She said some really nice things, which I’ll cherish for a really, really long time. I’ve really strived to be like her. Who knows? Maybe I can be even better.”

I think that is a huge goal for either player. It is good to have lofty goals, but both youngsters need to understand that being better than Serena is highly unlikely.

Can we let this play out a little? Personally I hope we have a few more Pennetta stories, where a veteran gets it together and wins a slam. Or Kerber-like stories. I think it’s a little harder now as a few verifiable stars have emerged, much like Azarenka when she arrived on the scene.

Let’s not make the mistake of equating what people say with how many slams they will have. They don’t hand out slam titles that way.

I will take that bet and raise you that all three with reach seven I actually like Osaka’s chances the worst because of her lavish lifestyle and the holes in her game.

Anyone see how muddy and dirty the Yarra River was? Even more than usual. Poor Australia is looking worse and worse. It really is sad.

Hartt, I have no problem with Andreescu giving everyone worldwide some insight into how she sees her opponents without Andreescu knowing. Other than it was crazy!!! Welcome to court side microphones.

That she believed it was funny, that was her assessment, she doesn’t think much of Pliskova’s game. That’s just what she thinks.

But in terms of characterizing Ms. Andreescu as a humble person whose ambition is anything but red hot, I think that’s not quite accurate in terms of what we know about her.

No one goes from qualies to a slam title including ripping a few Masters titles and going undefeated against top ten opponents without a pretty sure sense of themselves and their game.

Serena Williams said Andreescu reminds her of herself. Does Serena Williams say that about anyone?

Right Andrew. Roddick hated the pressure of being a Slam champion and didn’t really have the fire to compete. That is why he retired at such a younger age than his peers. Not like he had some debilitating injury.

He did it to make babies with his super hot wife, the SI model. That was what motivated him to win anyway, having a wife like that. I get it and I understand his decision but would have been nice for him to stick it out, give back to the younger players and show some grit like Lleyton Hewitt did.

Confidence is a funny thing. We’ve gone over this a lot. My analogy is the confidence tank – you have to fill it up. But it doesn’t fill up with puff talk.

Again my advice is keep the kid away from a microphone.

If you’re talking courage, which has nothing to do with a microphone, that’s always in short supply. So staring down some break points is courage and it’s as great in Coco against a confidant Cirstea as it was in Raonic against Garin when Garin began to play in the zone, however briefly.

A really good player like Raonic will figure out what’s going on, make some decisions, and do something interesting. He had a break to spare but decided it was important to hold. I like that, Nadal does it all the time, the mark of a higher level player.

Better believe he was happy to hold serve!

Underselling Roddick, the only guy who did exactly what you are all praising in Ms. Gauff.

Andrew, of course Bianca is supremely self confident. She backed up that confidence with exceptional results last season. In her comment about Pliskova I think she also said something like it wasn’t Halep. She thought that Halep would put up more of a fight than Pliskova, and she likely was right about that.

Ci Ci Bellis….wow. I am not a fan of her getting so many wildcards but she sure took advantage of this one. She looks about 10-15 lbs of muscle heavier than before her injury. In fantastic shape, mentally strong, one of the fastest players on tour and one of the best tacticians in the game.

Four major surgeries, injuries to shoulder, elbow, and wrist. And playing amazing tennis.

Good win for Vekic, Cornet can be difficult, and Muguruza beating Tomjlanovic in 3 isn’t a world shaker but it’s a match she would very likely have lost a short time ago. Martinez deserves a medal. Penko loses 5-7 5-7 to Bencic which is also better than Jelena might have expected. Kerber bt Hon SS and her reward is the relaunched Giorgi or Kuznetsova. Could lose to either depending on her mood.

It’s not something I’ve really thought about but I agree with Andrew that girls, I don’t know about boys, become pros earlier than they used to and maybe before they’ve fully developed which may account for the number of injuries among other things. Debt could be involved, sponsors etc. It’s a pricey business.

I really wish Bianca was in Melbourne. A fit Bianca of course. Then perhaps less of Gauff.

Pretty undignified – Bajin tweeting people to ‘shut up’ about Yastremska’s gamesmanship re her MTOs. Sascha becomes more dislikeable by the minute. A number of players have complained about Dayana’s behaviour so there’s very likely no smoke without fire here.

Don’t care about the reasons – Naomi was right to dump him and Kiki should count herself lucky this posturing ‘hitting partner’ exited when he saw a better opportunity.

As for Naomi, I feel sometimes when she lacks the intensity she can be had like that Serena match I forgot where where she let her have it sort of.

Bellis is quite a story to survive all those surgeries and finally get this kind of a pay-off. Players like her deserve more notoriety in the American media.

Anxiously awaiting Collins vs. Putintseva for a really feisty affair.

Interesting that Querrey and Sandgren will meet for the second time in the last three Slams. Querrey knocked out the Sandman in Wimbledon in the round of 16. The winner has a rea shot at the QFs against either Pella or Fognini.

That QF could be against Federer, who may have to get past Tommy Paul to get that far. Don’t be surprised if Paul slays the great one.