Rising US tennis sensation Cori Gauff has become the first 15-year-old to qualify for the main Wimbledon draw and win her maiden clash with Venus Williams, a tennis legend 24 years her senior, in the first round of the championship on Monday, July 1.
The teenager beat the five-time Wimbledon champion in straight sets (6-4, 6-4). Venus had won four Grand Slam titles, including two at Wimbledon, before Cori was even born.
“It’s the first time I have ever cried after winning a match,” Cori said in a post-match interview after saw one of the biggest upsets for the senior Williams sister.
“I don’t know how to explain how I feel,” she added, speaking to BBC. “I definitely had to tell myself to stay calm, I had to remind myself that the lines are the same lines, the courts are the same size, and after every point I told myself ‘stay calm’.”
Saying it would be a dream come true, Cori, aka Coco, had told reporters ahead of the match that the Williams sisters were her idols growing up.
Serena Williams “is the reason my dad decided to get me a racquet”, she’d told BBC in an interview. Her father Corey Gauff is believed to have played an instrumental role in shaping her for the tournament.
Expectations from Cori, currently world No. 301 in the WTA rankings, are indubitably high. Apart from her age (15 years and 122 days), her membership of Team Mouratoglou makes her worth watching out for.
Cori along with a group of youngsters, including Greek sensation Stefanos Tsitsipas, train out of Serena Williams coach Patrick Mouratoglous academy in the south of France. On Thursday, she became the youngest player to ever come through the women’s singles qualifying rounds.
All you need to know about Coco
The youngest to qualify since the Open era began in 1968, Cori arrived on Court One on Monday to take on the oldest player in the draw.
Hailing from Florida, Cori is the youngest in the main draw since Britain’s Laura Robson, who was 14 when she won a title at the All England Club – the Wimbledon girls championship in 2008.
Venus has won seven Grand Slam singles titles, five at the All England Club.
Cori received a wild card to qualify for the main draw after three ruthless straight-set victories in qualifying rounds on Thursday. “I found out [at the] last minute,” she told the BBC. “I wasn’t even packed to come here, so it’s just crazy how life can turn around in a second.”
Coach Mouratoglou told reporters, “She qualified in a very nice way, played really well, didnt lose a set. Last round of qualifiers, she was really impressive, won 6-1 6-1, playing really great tennis.”
When asked, before the match, if she was happy with her draw and a dream debut with Venus, Cori had said she was excited to see how she would perform against “those still at the top of their game in their late thirties”. “I hope I’m still playing and doing well at 39.”
The record-breaking teenager reached the US Open girls’ final aged 13 in 2017 and won the French Open girls’ singles title a year later, becoming the youngest junior Grand Slam champion since Martina Hingis in Paris.
Why this matters
Robson, who was the youngest winner of Wimbledon girls since Hingis in 1994, had been praised by Billie Jean King as the real deal. On a similar note, Serena Williams, the 37-year-old winner of 23 Grand Slams, is a fan of Cori. Even Roger Federer is in awe of her.
Unquestionably, Coris battle of the generations against veteran Venus was a highly anticipated one on the first day of the championship. It is also a historic moment for African-American women.
Cori, for whom the journey towards the biggest tennis stage plateaus at just 15, also serves as visible proof that young women can aspire to more than the usual first-round exit with focus and support from a very young age. In an interview with Reem Abulleil of The National Sport, she narrates how she balances school and tennis.
Coach Mouratoglou was confident of her chances against the tennis ace. “When youre in the first round of a major you can beat potentially all the players in the draw,” he’d told Metro.
Mouratoglou, who has known her since she was 10, said Cori’s greatest strengths come from within. Visibly, however, she has a big serve and a flat backhand that stays low, and she is a good natural mover on the notoriously tricky to navigate green turf.
“Shes young, she has big potential. She wants it, but we shouldnt put people where theyre not. She has just qualified for her first Grand Slam, achieved great things as a junior, shown a lot of qualities but its a long way to go,” he says, urging fans and critics to not draw unwarranted comparisons between her and his star trainee Serena or with her first Wimbledon opponent Venus.
But expectations are definitely high and comparisons inevitable, especially in a sport that rewards youth. Players like Cori and Ukraine’s Daria Lopatetskaya also offer inspiration to young players and encouragement to women around the world to take up tennis, especially at a crucial moment in history for women’s sports when there’s momentum around the fair sex on the playing field.
Prarthana Mitra is a Staff Writer at Qrius