{"id":15373,"date":"2024-01-08T00:07:56","date_gmt":"2024-01-08T05:07:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/sport\/coco-gauff-rallies-to-defeat-elina-svitolina-in-auckland-final\/08\/01\/2024\/"},"modified":"2024-01-08T00:07:56","modified_gmt":"2024-01-08T05:07:56","slug":"coco-gauff-rallies-to-defeat-elina-svitolina-in-auckland-final","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/sport\/coco-gauff-rallies-to-defeat-elina-svitolina-in-auckland-final\/08\/01\/2024\/","title":{"rendered":"Coco Gauff rallies to defeat Elina Svitolina in Auckland final"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>AUCKLAND, New Zealand &#8212; Top-seeded <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/sports\/tennis\/players\/profile?playerId=3626\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Coco Gauff<\/a> has retained her title at the WTA Auckland Classic, beating second-seeded <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/sports\/tennis\/players\/profile?playerId=1797\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Elina Svitolina<\/a> 6-7 (4), 6-3, 6-3 in Sunday&#8217;s final.<\/p>\n<p>For the first time all week, Gauff had a fight on her hands. She swept into the final without dropping a set; in fact, dropping only 15 games on her way through the semifinals.<\/p>\n<p>That followed her flawless tournament last year when she didn&#8217;t drop a set at all and capped off a perfect week with a 6-1, 6-1 win over <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/sports\/tennis\/players\/profile?playerId=2984\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Rebeka Masarova<\/a> in the final.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"inline editorial float-r\" data-behavior=\"article_related\">\n<h2 class=\"editorial-title\">Editor&#8217;s Picks<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><a name=\"&amp;lpos=story:editorspicks:inline:1\" href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.co.uk\/tennis\/story\/_\/id\/39257555\/elena-rybakina-beats-aryna-sabalenka-wins-brisbane-international\" class=\"img-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\"><\/a><\/li>\n<li><a name=\"&amp;lpos=story:editorspicks:inline:2\" href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.co.uk\/tennis\/story\/_\/id\/39258091\/germany-wins-united-cup-title-alexander-zverev-comeback\" class=\"img-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\"><img style=\"display:block\" class=\"lazyload\" data-sizes=\"auto\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?w=75&resize=75 75w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?w=100&resize=100 100w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?w=150&resize=150 150w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?w=240&resize=240 240w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?w=320&resize=320 320w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?w=500&resize=500 500w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?w=640&resize=640 640w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?w=800&resize=800 800w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?w=1024&resize=1024 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?w=1280&resize=1280 1280w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?w=1600&resize=1600 1600w\" data-src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i\" width=\"65\" height=\"65\"\/><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>1 Related<\/p>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Third-ranked Gauff had needed only four hours of court time to reach the final whereas Ukraine&#8217;s Svitolina took twice that much, beating <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/tennis\/player\/_\/id\/3155\/wang-xiyu\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Wang Xiyu<\/a> of China 2-6, 6-4, 6-3 in a match that lasted four-and-a-half hours with rain breaks.<\/p>\n<p>Sunday&#8217;s match against Svitolina was by far the toughest Gauff has faced in this, the first week of her 2024 season. She had to come from a set down for the first time, and it took 2 hours, 23 minutes to complete her victory. Previously, Gauff&#8217;s longest match at the tournament had been 1 hour, 22 minutes.<\/p>\n<p>It was a struggle throughout. Gauff&#8217;s serve has been the cornerstone of her game all week. She served 10 aces alone in her 6-3, 6-1 win over fellow American <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/sports\/tennis\/players\/profile?playerId=3785\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Emma Navarro<\/a> in the semifinals and won 80% of points all week when her first serve was in play.<\/p>\n<p>Against Svitolina, Gauff managed only three aces and had seven double-faults. She put only 65% of first serves in play and had 43 unforced errors.<\/p>\n<p>Gauff looked uncomfortable against the hard-hitting Svitolina, who was tenacious and ran down shots that Gauff previously would have counted as winners.<\/p>\n<p>But she persevered and had a winning edge in the third set in which she broke Svitolina only once, in the eighth game.<\/p>\n<p>She served for the match and championship in the next game and had to save a break point before winning on her first match point. She became the first player since Julia Goerges in 2018 and 2019 to win back-to-back Auckland titles and the first American to do so since Patty Fendick in 1988 and 1989.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This is the first time ever having to defend a title, so I&#8217;m really happy I was able to do it today,&#8221; Gauff said. &#8220;I&#8217;d like to congratulate Elina for an incredible week. What you do, being a mum and coming back so fast and at such a high level, is pretty inspiring. Hopefully &#8212; not any time soon &#8212; I&#8217;ll be able to do it like you&#8217;ve done it.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Gauff broke Svitolina in the fourth game of the first set, but Svitolina broke back immediately. Svitolina was broken again in the eighth game and, again, broke back straight in a service game in which Gauff had two double-faults. The set went to a tiebreak, won comfortably by Svitolina at 7-4.<\/p>\n<p>Gauff started the second set by breaking Svitolina and broke her again in the seventh game. Svitolina broke back in the eighth game, but Gauff broke again. She was 15-40 down serving for the set but recovered to level the match.<\/p>\n<p>The third set was a tight one with some extraordinary rallies in which both players mixed power and touch. Gauff took the vital service break in the eighth game and again faced a break point before serving out the set and match.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s been a really great experience to play for the first time here,&#8221; Svitolina said. &#8220;I want to congratulate Coco and her team for the great start to the year and good luck at the Australian Open.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve been really enjoying myself here, playing great matches. It was a tough loss today, but I hope I can come back next year to play more tennis here.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Svitolina was supported courtside throughout the week by husband <a href=\"http:\/\/www.espn.com\/sports\/tennis\/players\/profile?playerId=242\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Gael Monfils<\/a>, who will play the men&#8217;s Auckland Classic, which starts Monday.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.co.uk\/tennis\/story\/_\/id\/39257243\/coco-gauff-rallies-defeat-elina-svitolina-auckland-final\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>AUCKLAND, New Zealand &mdash; Top-seeded Coco Gauff has retained her title at the WTA Auckland Classic, beating second-seeded Elina Svitolina 6-7 (4),<br \/><button class=\"read-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/sport\/coco-gauff-rallies-to-defeat-elina-svitolina-in-auckland-final\/08\/01\/2024\/\">Read More &rsaquo;<\/a><\/button><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15376,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[213],"tags":[3823,114,1241,3848,153,115,928,3849],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15373"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15373"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15373\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15375,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15373\/revisions\/15375"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15376"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15373"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15373"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15373"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}