Coco Gauff called Paula Badosa lovely and acknowledged that during an extremely hard and demanding injury period, she felt driven to get in touch with the Spaniard.
Badosa played in just one more tournament during the remainder of 2023 after suffering a stress fracture in her back in Rome precisely a year ago. Badosa has been dealing with back problems this year. Tragically, the 26-year-old just disclosed that the problem is chronic and that she may be nearing the end of her tennis career.
During an interview, Badosa revealed that she received a message from 2023 US Open champion Gauff asking how she was doing.
In addition, Gauff was told to speak to Badosa in front of their round-of-16 meeting in Rome, exposing her act and emphasizing how much she valued it.
Gauff stated her remarks about Badosa and said: “I think she’s a player who loves to play tennis. Unfortunately, with all the injuries she’d had trying to come back, something else was happening. I felt compelled to just send her a message. I do that with most players on tour that I know. I’ll send a message if I have their number or if we follow each other on Instagram.”
She added: “Definitely, I think we’re pretty friendly on tour. We aren’t close friends. We’re definitely in different stages. I feel like that’s a lot of me on tour. I think she’s 25 maybe, so five years’ age gap. We’re never going to be close friends, but I’m friendly with her on tour. I always root for her.”
Gauff in Rome, ranking, and results in 2024
WWWWWLWWWW Now ranked no.3 (career-high), Coco has achieved a composed 24-7 record in 2024. Gauff is competing in Rome where she defeated the world no.55 Magdalena Frech 6-3 6-3, the world no.68 Jaqueline Cristian 6-1 0-6 6-3 and the world no.126 Paula Badosa Gibert 5-7 6-4 6-1.
Coco Gauff will square off with the world no.7 Qinwen Zheng in the quarter. In the past, they have never played each other till now in top competitions.
Coco has won 1 title in 2024 in Auckland.
Coco won 7 titles in her career: 5 on hard courts, 1 on clay courts and 1 on indoor courts. (See the list of her titles)
Paula Badosa in 2024
LWWLWWWLLW Now ranked no.126, Badosa played her last match on the 13th of May when she lost to world no.3 Cori Gauff 5-7 6-4 6-1 in the 4th round in Rome (draw).
Until now, during this year Paula owns a composed 9-10 win-loss record.
Coco Gauff and Paula Badosa fought against each other 5 times. Their current record is 3-2 for Badosa. The last time they squared off, Coco Gauff won 5-7 6-4 6-1 in the 4th round in Rome (Internazionali BNL d’Italia) on the 13th of May 2024.
In the following video you can watch the key moments of their match.
