World number six Coco Gauff has revealed that her primary focus in the coming months will be to iron out the flaws in her serve. This comes after the American added Matt Daly to her coaching team, joining her long-time mentor Jean-Christophe Faurel, ahead of the China Open. Gauff won her first Grand Slam title at the US Open last year under Brad Gilbert, but their partnership ended this month following a frustrating fourth-round exit at the same tournament, where she committed a whopping 19 double faults.
Gauff, who has a clear vision for her future success, is confident that improving her serve will be the key to unlocking her full potential. “There are other parts of my game that I want to work on too, but the focus right now is the serve,” Gauff told the WTA Insider in Beijing. “When I serve well, I play pretty well. For me, that’s the basis for my game. … Already, the little bit we’ve done has made a drastic improvement to where I was three weeks ago.”
The young star is determined to capitalize on this new approach, stating, “At this point, there’s not a crazy amount, like going through a technique change or resetting everything. It’s just subtle things that, doing it for a week now, will help me.”
Gauff is enthusiastic about working with Daly, who previously coached Denis Shapovalov, and believes this new dynamic will be a long-term solution. “I think this is probably what it will look like next year too. I’m super excited for a new change and hopefully to improve other parts of my game,” she shared. “Working with Brad was really great and obviously we had a great partnership. It was just time to do a reset, a refresh and add some things in my game that I felt like I need to do to have a better season next year.”
Gauff will kick off her campaign in the Chinese capital this week against Frenchwoman Clara Burel, hoping to build momentum and showcase the positive impact of her newly honed serve. As she continues to refine her game, the tennis world will be watching closely to see if her strategic focus on serve improvement can lead her to even greater heights in the upcoming season.
