US Open 2024: Defending champion Coco Gauf roars past Tatjana Maria into third round

New York: Defending champion Coco Gauff cleaned up early mistakes to beat unseeded German Tatjana Maria 6-4 6-0 in a lopsided second round meeting at the US Open on Wednesday.

The American beat Maria in Auckland last year and she held on to the blueprint, roaring back from an error-riddled first set to sweep through the second and close out the affair with a sublime backhand winner.

Gauff was red hot as she broke Maria in the opening game but helped her opponent to a break point with a handful of clumsy errors in the next game.

The third seed hardly had the run-up to New York that she had hoped for as she crashed out of Toronto and Cincinnati early, and she appeared visibly frustrated at times as she put up 20 unforced errors and seven double faults in the first set.

She turned it around when she broke her opponent from the baseline in the seventh game and clawed her way back from 15-40 in the 10th and had a poker face as she walked back to her bench when Maria sent one past the baseline on set point.

Maria dropped her serve with a double fault in the first game of the second set and Gauff forced the German into an error to make it 3-0, running away with the match as she improved virtually every aspect of her game.