Coco Gauff was made to work extremely hard in her opening match at the US Open, but it ultimately paid off as the home star managed to scrape past 79th-ranked Ajla Tomljanovic 6-4 6-7 (2) 7-5 in three hours of play.
Before coming to New York, the American tennis star had a rough summer, losing in the Wimbledon first round and also not doing particularly well in Montreal and Cincinnati. Poor results but also disappointing results led to the 21-year-old ditching coach Matt Daly and hiring biomechanics expert Gavin MacMillan.
In her first match since a major shakeup, Gauff trailed 1-3 early on before taking five of the next six games and sealing the opener. In the second set, the American twice blew a break - and she paid the price for that - as Tomljanovic dominated the tie-break to send the match into a decider.
Just as was the case in the second set, Gauff was twice up by a break but Tomljanovic twice came back. However, this time, the No. 3 seed remained calmer as she earned another break in the 11th game before serving out for the match in the following game.
By beating Tomljanovic, the American - who plays against Donna Vekic in the US Open second round - avoided exiting back-to-back Grand Slams in the first round for the first time in her career.
Gauff's reaction to beating Tomljanovic
"Yeah, it was a tough match. I had chances for it to be straight sets. Ajla was tough. It wasnt the best, but Im happy to get through to the next round. I had so many chances and [I knew] eventually it was going to come. I had chances to close out in two, I had chances to go up a double break so many times, so yeah I was just like eventually one of these are going to go my way and it ended up happening," the home star said after the match.
