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    Coco Gauff Has a Chance to Play the Wise Veteran at the French Open

    Gauff, now 19 and in her fifth season on the tour, took on Mirra Andreeva, who is 16 and the latest teenager to go on a tear in women’s tennis.Tennis moves fast.The veteran tennis star Rafael Nadal recently made that observation, discussing how quickly a new generation of players assumes the role of the one before. His words were never truer than on the Suzanne Lenglen court at Roland Garros on Saturday, where Coco Gauff, now in her fifth season on the tour at 19 years old, was locked in a duel with an opponent who reminded Gauff and everyone else of herself from Wimbledon in 2019.That rival was Mirra Andreeva, a 16-year-old Russian who has exploded onto the women’s tennis tour over the past five weeks.She knocks off top 20 players. She plays with an easy, smooth power, unruffled by the size of the stage and the fuss suddenly being made about her. She trades text messages with Andy Murray, the three-time Grand Slam champion. She makes sarcastic jokes in news conferences in English.A similar hype surrounded Gauff four years ago at the All England Club, beating Venus Williams on Centre Court and rolling into the fourth round, riding a hot streak, limited knowledge and the lazy anticipation that the next Serena had arrived. These days, she continues to hunt for her first Grand Slam and top-level tour title.Glass half-full: Gauff is 19 and is already ranked sixth in singles and third in doubles and still doesn’t have her grown-up strength, as she has said her mother puts it. She is also one of the game’s great athletes, with an active mind and an awareness beyond the lines of the tennis court.Glass half-empty: Gauff has accumulated some baggage in the form of disappointing losses and inconsistent results during the past few months, and she takes that hard. After her loss in the fourth round at the Australian Open, Gauff left the news conference in tears. She knows opponents pick on her forehand. Her serve can disappear in tense moments.And now she’s got talented, free-swinging younger teenagers with a nothing-to-lose attitude like Andreeva’s closing in on her potential as the next big thing.“Transitioning into adulthood,” is how Gauff described her journey in life and tennis on the eve of the French Open.Clodagh Kilcoyne/ReutersIt is both a blessing and a curse of tennis how easy and quickly the declarations of future greatness can come. A couple of early wins, like Andreeva has managed in Paris, on the big stage at a Grand Slam tournament are often all it takes, even if those wins come by an easy draw or catching an opponent on an off day.This is especially true in women’s tennis, where fully developed raw power is less of a requirement and more girls than boys are able to gain enough of it to compete at the highest level. But tour veterans say that one of their biggest fears is playing a hot young player whose tendencies and weaknesses are still unknown.“They always win a bunch of matches because no coach has figured it out yet or broken the code,” said Sloane Stephens, 30, who had her own next-big-thing moments as a teenager.The pandemic, Stephens said, exacerbated the issue. There were so few opportunities to see the teenage prospects on the cusp of the tour because so many junior tournaments were canceled or players could not travel.There is a mental aspect to the dynamic as well. A young player often comes to the court believing she has nothing to lose, and some veterans are certain they are about to teach a lesson to the whippersnapper on the other side of the net.Daria Kasatkina said that older teens in the junior ranks are terrified of playing and losing to younger ones and that fear can extend to the tour, when the youngest players are taking on adults.“At 16, you’re not nervous,” Kasatkina said. “I would say it’s a little advantage. It’s disadvantage, and it’s advantage.”Kasatkina, who is from Russia, was high on her countrywoman, saying she was already physically strong and beating good players on her way to becoming the most talked about newcomer at the French Open.For 65 minutes Saturday, the hype was on track to grow. Andreeva was every bit the match for Gauff, especially in the tight moments.She broke Gauff’s serve when the 19-year-old was serving for the set at 6-5, and then let Gauff give her three set points in the tiebreaker with a shaky forehand and a misfired drop shot. Andreeva whacked a ball into the crowd in anger after losing two of them (“a really stupid move,” she said later), but on her third chance she hit the back of the line on her serve and put away a big forehand to put Gauff in a one-set hole.But then Gauff stopped giving away points, and Andreeva, with around 10,000 fans in attendance, started to show the lesser qualities of her 16-year-old self. She threw her racket on the court when she dropped an early game in the second set. An ugly, soft and looping second serve early in the third set gave Gauff a 3-1 lead, and it was smooth sailing from there.Andreeva later said that after she won the first set, the free-and-easy mood she had been playing with since she survived qualifying slipped away. Suddenly, she started thinking about how she was a set away from the final 16 of her first Grand Slam.“A mistake from me,” she said. “I should have just continued playing.”Andreeva was a difficult opponent for Gauff throughout the match.Clive Mason/Getty ImagesGauff said she told herself that her game plan was essentially working, that she had frittered away a set that she had basically won, but she had also learned how to read body language and to draw confidence when an opponent was growing angry. Chalk one up for age and experience.Gauff, by her own admission, is in the purgatory years of her evolution, both on the court and off.“Transitioning into adulthood,” is how she described it on the eve of the tournament, trying to figure out which qualities from adolescence she wants to hang on to and which ones she wants to discard.Gauff is on the stiffer side of the draw, with a possible quarterfinal match against Iga Swiatek, the world No. 1 who beat Gauff in last year’s final in Paris, if she can get through Anna Karolina Schmiedlova. However, Gauff’s half of the draw became slightly easier Saturday after Elena Rybakina, one of the hottest players in the world this year, withdrew with a respiratory illness.Once more Gauff will be the younger player in her fourth-round match on Monday. Schmiedlova, of Slovakia, is 28 and ranked 100th in the world.She said she was long past factoring those numbers into her approach to matches, but she was highly qualified to give advice to at least one demographic in the professional ranks — the upstarts like Andreeva.“Do it for you,” Gauff said, when asked what she would tell Andreeva about how to approach everything that will, rightly or wrongly, come next after her breakout run in Paris. “Don’t do it for anyone else. When you step on the court you want to make sure it’s for you, and I think life and the game will be a lot more enjoyable that way.” More

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    Daria Kasatkina’s Tumultuous and Triumphant Season

    The tennis star has spoken out against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and come out as gay with her partner, the figure skater and fellow Russian Natalia Zabiiako. And she’s winning.FORT WORTH — As Daria Kasatkina’s match with the American teenager Coco Gauff took many a twist and turn on Thursday night, Kasatkina’s thoughts were hard to read: Her neutral, deeply focused expression gave little hint of the score until she had closed out her round-robin victory, 7-6 (6), 6-3, at the WTA Finals with a roar and a clenched fist.Kasatkina, a 25-year-old Russian who will face Caroline Garcia on Saturday for a place in the semifinals, is in the moment and back in the groove in her first appearance in this elite year-end event, reserved for the top eight women’s singles players and top eight doubles teams.But it has been a tumultuous, ultimately triumphant season for Kasatkina. In July, in an interview with the Russian blogger Vitya Kravchenko, she came out as gay, making her relationship public with the former Olympic pairs figure skater Natalia Zabiiako. In that same interview, Kasatkina also became the first Russian tennis star to speak out in depth against the war with Ukraine.Both are risky moves in Russia, where the government led by President Vladimir V. Putin has enacted laws restricting dissent against the war and banned the portrayal of gay relationships in books, films and the media.Kasatkina, who called the war a “full-blown nightmare” and expressed empathy for Ukrainian players, has long trained in Spain with her coach, Carlos Martinez, and is now based in Dubai. She has not returned to Russia, where she still has family, since a visit to St. Petersburg in February, shortly before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.Has this been her year of being brave?“Maybe yes,” she said in an interview in Fort Worth. “I was saying those things not to look brave but to give to the people my point of view and my feelings. So, if they see that this was brave, good, but it was not to look brave, completely not.”Some Ukrainian players, including Ukraine’s former Billie Jean King Cup captain Olga Savchuk, thanked Kasatkina personally.“At least she tried and did something and can live with a clean soul,” Savchuk said in a text message on Friday. “I can easily look in her face now when I meet her, because I know what she thinks.”Asked what the feedback had been like in Russia, Kasatkina demurred. “Let’s not talk about it,” she said.But she said that she had been touched by the level of support internationally for her decision to come out about her sexuality and to live openly with Zabiiako, a 2018 Olympian for Russia, who is with her and Martinez in Fort Worth.More on Women and Girls in SportsHawaii Sex Discrimination: A lawsuit alleging Title IX violations at a Hawaii high school could be a landmark stress test for the law.Abuse in Women’s Soccer: The publication of the Yates Report, detailing “systemic abuse” throughout the sport, is only the beginning.Pretty in Any Color: Women’s basketball players are styling themselves how they want, because they can. Their choices also can be lucrative.Title IX’s Racial Gaps: Because race has never been part of the law, Title IX has heavily benefited white women over women of color.“I didn’t know what to expect, and everything went perfectly, I think,” Kasatkina said. “And I’m just really thankful to everyone who messaged me, who supported me. Of course, there was also some negative parts, but I just didn’t feel it at all. Just the people on the internet, so it wasn’t important to me at all.”Kasatkina said her life day-to-day had not changed nearly as much as her mood.“I just started to feel much better,” Kasatkina said. “Just being myself and feeling more free to do the things I want to do, the things I feel I need to do. It’s amazing. To live with the feeling of freedom, it’s a great feeling.”Kasatkina, left, came out as gay earlier this year, making public her relationship with the Russian figure skater Natalia Zabiiako.John G Mabanglo/EPA, via ShutterstockShe has climbed back into the top 10 in 2022, snagging the eighth and last singles qualifying spot for the WTA Finals after serving as an alternate in 2018 in Singapore without getting to play a match.“I guess we could say I caught the last train to be here,” Kasatkina said. “I was pretty stressed in the race, because it was pretty tight. But being here feels great.”Banned from Wimbledon along with all players from Russia and its ally Belarus, Kasatkina might not have qualified for Fort Worth if the tours had not stripped Wimbledon of ranking points in retaliation for the Russian ban.Elena Rybakina, a Russian-born player who now represents Kazakhstan, won the Wimbledon women’s singles title, but, without the 2,000 points that normally go with a Grand Slam title, did not qualify for the WTA Finals.Kasatkina and the Belarusian star Aryna Sabalenka both finished in the top eight and have been able to play a nearly full season because of the tours’ decision to allow individuals from Russia and Belarus to compete, albeit without flags or national identification.“Of course, we appreciate that we can keep our jobs and play,” Kasatkina said. “We are lucky, and we are super thankful for this.”Her resurgent season has been a long time coming. Though Kasatkina can summon baseline power, her game is, above all, based on craft and spin, on rhythm and tactical shifts.Her former coach Philippe Dehaes called her “a tennis genius,” and with his help she rose to No. 10 in 2018, reaching the final of the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells, Calif., before losing to Naomi Osaka in what was a breakthrough tournament for both young talents.But Kasatkina was unable to sustain that momentum, splitting with Dehaes in 2019 and spiraling, by her own account, into depression and a crisis of confidence that had her seriously contemplating quitting the sport.Carlos Martinez began coaching Kasatkina in June 2019.Carmen Mandato/Getty ImagesBut she worked through it with help from a psychologist, as well as her brother Alexandr and Martinez, a former Spanish satellite-level player who long coached Kasatkina’s Russian compatriot Svetlana Kuznetsova.“Carlos took me from the bottom when I was completely broken, let’s say,” Kasatkina said. “We did a very good job together coming back to the top 10. I’m glad and grateful that he had this patience.”Martinez, who began coaching her in June 2019, believed in Kasatkina’s talent but needed to help her recover confidence.“She came from tough moments when the expectation around her was very high, finishing top 10 in 2018,” Martinez said Thursday. “In the beginning, it was just about building a base, building a player who could play on every surface and can adapt to different games.”Although she can summon baseline power, Kasatkina’s game is based on craft and spin.Martin Divisek/EPA, via ShutterstockThe pandemic gave them additional time to work at Martinez’s club, and they focused more on improving tactics and attitude than on technical adjustments“Two or three years ago, this match with Coco, she would have lost, 6-2, 6-2,” Martinez said. “No chance. You would have seen frustration, but now, no. She knows she can change the course of the match every single point.”Consistency remains an issue. Kasatkina has lost in one of her first two rounds in 11 events this year, but she also reached her first Grand Slam semifinal at the French Open and won two singles titles, compiling a 40-20 record through all the travels and the tumult.Against Garcia on Saturday, she can extend her finest season for at least one more match and then head to the Maldives with Zabiiako for sun, calm and vacation.Returning to Russia will have to wait.“Maybe when the war will be finished,” she said. More

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    Coco Gauff Reaches French Open Final, Will Face Iga Swiatek

    Gauff and Swiatek each advanced in their semifinals Thursday by winning in straight sets.PARIS — It is easy to be in a rush when you reach the fourth round of Wimbledon at age 15, beating one of your idols, Venus Williams, in your opening match. It is easy to be in a hurry when the sponsors and the platform are already in place, and you have been hearing from experts and the voice inside your own head that you have what it takes to be a champion.But tennis is a trickier game than most: a blend of the physical, the technical and the psychological with so much time to think between points and serves and so many tournaments, time changes and defeats to navigate.Coco Gauff, even if she is only 18, has had to be more patient than she planned. But the young American’s potential and performances under pressure are beginning to converge. On Saturday, she will play in her first Grand Slam singles final, facing the No. 1 seed, Iga Swiatek, at the French Open for the title and the Coupe Suzanne Lenglen.“There’s a fine line between believing in yourself and almost pushing yourself too much,” Gauff said on Thursday after her semifinal victory, 6-3, 6-1, over Martina Trevisan, sounding, as usual, rather older than her years.Gauff, the youngest Grand Slam singles finalist since Maria Sharapova won Wimbledon in 2004 at age 17, was comparing her expectations with those she had a season ago, when she reached the quarterfinals of the French Open. She found herself unable to manage the pressure and the critical points and flung her racket across the clay in frustration while losing to Barbora Krejcikova, the unseeded eventual champion.“At that moment, I wanted it too much,” she said. “Whereas now, I definitely want it. Yes, who wouldn’t? But also, it’s not going to be the end of the world if it doesn’t happen for me.”The odds, make no mistake, are still significantly against her. Gauff faces the toughest task available in women’s tennis.Swiatek, 21, extended her winning streak to 34 matches in Thursday’s first semifinal by overwhelming the 20th-seeded Daria Kasatkina, 6-2, 6-1, in just over an hour.That score and breakneck pace have been typical for Swiatek, the powerful and increasingly imposing Polish star. She has not lost a match since February and has beaten Gauff in their two previous matches in straight sets: winning, 7-6 (3), 6-3, on red clay in the semifinals of last year’s Italian Open and winning, 6-3, 6-1, on a hardcourt in the round of 16 at this year’s Miami Open in March.“She’s definitely the favorite going into the match on paper,” Gauff said. “But I think that going in, I’m just going to play free and play my best tennis. I think in a Grand Slam final, anything can happen.”Gauff during her match against Martina Trevisan of Italy.James Hill for The New York TimesGauff’s ability to extend points with her speed and defensive skills could certainly force Swiatek into more errors than usual. Under the guidance of Diego Moyano, the veteran coach who joined her team in April, Gauff has improved her tactics, according to her father, Corey Gauff, who has been her main coach since childhood.“Playing to her strengths means not rushing all the time,” Corey Gauff said in an interview on Thursday night. He added: “He’s able to communicate to her how it makes him feel on the other side of the net when she does something. He’s trying to get her to understand why she’s making the decision and what the impact is. And he’s been pretty effective compared to dad. We dads tend to be command and control, and that doesn’t always work.”But clay remains Swiatek’s favorite canvas. She won the French Open in 2020 at age 19. Gauff lost in the second round of that tournament to Trevisan, looking increasingly distraught as her double fault count rose. She finished with 19. On Thursday, she finished with just two, her lowest total of this Roland Garros.“She’s learning to manage the emotions and understanding that double faults are a part of the game and that you don’t need to overreact,” Corey Gauff said.Though Coco Gauff was only 4-3 on clay this year before Roland Garros, she has not lost a set in six matches. “I’m going to be honest,” she said. “This year I hadn’t had the best results going into this. So it wasn’t expected at all, really.”Gauff graduated from year-round, online high school earlier this spring, celebrating her achievement with a photo taken in front of the Eiffel Tower before the French Open. Corey Gauff believes that has helped her fly higher in Paris.“That release when you finish high school or college is real,” he said. “She’s always had work to turn in, and it’s always in the back of your mind. I feel like this is the first tournament she’s played with no homework.”But she is still following current events, and on Thursday, after defeating Trevisan, she walked across the red clay for the now-customary signing of the television camera glass and decided, quite spontaneously she explained, to make a statement about last month’s elementary school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, in which 19 students and two teachers were killed.“Peace. End Gun violence,” Gauff wrote, drawing a heart next to her first name.“That was just a message for the people back at home to watch and for people who are all around the world to watch,” she said, adding: “Hopefully it gets into the heads of people in office to hopefully change things.”Gauff said she was influenced by athletes such as the former N.F.L. quarterback Colin Kaepernick and her fellow tennis star Naomi Osaka, who have been outspoken on social and cultural issues. But Gauff’s family also made it clear to her from an early age that she could have a reach far beyond the court.“My dad told me I could change the world with my racket,” she said. “He didn’t mean that by like just playing tennis. He meant speaking out on issues like this. The first thing my dad said to me after I got off court: ‘I’m proud of you, and I love what you wrote on the camera.’”Corey Gauff said he first told his daughter of the influence she could have when she was 6 or 7.“I am glad she’s being aware of what’s going on around her,” he said. “She has a brother who is 8 years old and is in elementary school. It’s not hard for it to hit home. I’m glad she is aware and bringing the attention and empathy to it. She’s not just hitting the tennis ball. She’s a global citizen.”Still, tennis is certainly a focus at Roland Garros. Gauff, seeded 18th, is guaranteed to rise to a career-high No. 13 and could rise as high as No. 8 if she defeats Swiatek. She is not just aiming for the singles title. She and her partner, Jessica Pegula, are into the semifinals of the women’s doubles and will face their American compatriots Taylor Townsend and Madison Keys on Friday.Gauff’s younger brothers — 8-year-old Cameron and 14-year-old Codey — are scheduled to arrive in Paris on Friday morning after traveling from the family’s home in Delray Beach, Fla.“They are coming over for the singles final and hopefully the doubles final as well,” Corey Gauff said.Cameron’s birthday is on Sunday.“He’s coming to Paris as an 8-year-old and leaving as a 9-year-old,” Corey Gauff said with a chuckle.Cameron’s big sister has a chance to leave as a Grand Slam champion. More