Coco Gauff beat Belinda Bencic to achieve the quarterfinals of the Australian Open

MELBOURNE, Australia – Coco Gauff’s streak has ended on the Australian Open. Her quest for a second Grand Slam title continued on Sunday with a 5-7, 6-2, 6-1 win over Belinda Bencic within the fourth spherical.

Gauff, the 20-year-old from Florida who received the 2023 US Open as a junior, had collected all 16 units she had performed this 12 months and 24 of her earlier 25 matches by the tip of final season, together with the title. WTA finals.

However the event’s No. 3 could not management his pictures sufficient early in opposition to Bencic in a sizzling afternoon at Rod Laver Area, the place the temperature reached 90 levels Fahrenheit (32 Celsius) and the enjoying inexperienced was drenched in daylight. .

Spectators sitting on the perimeters of the sphere have been fanning themselves; Gauff desires to be relieved of the cool air that was accessible on the bench.

Because the disaster escalated in direction of the tip of the primary set, when Bencic broke in every of Gauff’s final service video games – one in every of which led to two faults – the American stored lacking the mark, racking up 20 unforced errors.

When his shot lands on the web, too lengthy or too large, or Bencic’s falls past his attain, Gauff repeatedly turns to his coaches’ field and opens his arms, palms up, as if asking, “What ought to I do? what is going on to be achieved?” After 9 extra of his errors, Gauff hit his leg.

However Gauff rebalanced after an hour-long first set, racking up factors in bunches, repeatedly returning serves and doing a a lot better job of recognizing from the baseline. All in all, he was very a lot again to his good self, and Gauff not solely lower his unforced errors halfway by the second set, however went on a 17-2 run in that span.

Ultimately, Gauff was in full management, and pumped up the group for one more roar after a reflex volley to win a degree within the last recreation.

A part of the issue at first, to make sure, is that Bencic is a horrible ball-striker. Her present rating of No. 294 is deceptive: The 27-year-old Swiss, who reached No. 4 in her profession, returned to work in October on maternity depart.

Her earlier finest outcomes have come on laborious courts, together with a run to the semifinals of the US Open in 2019 and a single gold medal on the 2021 Tokyo Olympics. She is now 0-3 in fourth-round matches at Melbourne Park, nevertheless, with earlier losses to Worldwide Tennis Corridor of Fame member Maria Sharapova in 2016 and eventual champion Aryna Sabalenka two years in the past.

Gauff now faces eleventh seed Paula Badosa within the quarterfinals on Tuesday. Badosa defeated Olga Danilovic 6-1, 7-6 (2) to achieve the final eight in Melbourne for the primary time.

Winner of Gauff vs. Badosa will play with No. 1 Sabalenka, who’s looking for a 3rd straight Australian Open title, or No. 27 Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, the 2021 French Open runner-up.

Sabalenka prolonged her Melbourne profitable streak to 18 matches with a 6-1, 6-2 win over 14th-ranked Mirra Andreeva, whereas Pavlyuchenkova beat No. 18 Donna Vekic 7-6 (0), 6-0.

Martina Hingis, from 1997 to 1999, was the final lady to have three straight titles in Australia.