Coco Gauff on dealing with criticism, living on her own and the 'groundbreaking' WTA Finals in Riyadh

This week will be quite an “anxious” week for Coco Gauff, and not because she is competing for high stakes at the WTA Finals in Riyadh.

While she navigates a tough round-robin group she shares with Iga Swiatek, Jessica Pegula, and Barbora Krejcikova, the American world No 3 will be keeping an eye on the US presidential election, which will hit its climax on November 5, right in the middle of the tournament.

“I voted. I posted content trying to encourage people to vote. It's definitely on my mind,” Gauff told reporters in Riyadh on Friday.

“It's a tough time for our country, a crucial time for our country right now. All I can do is encourage people, especially young people, to vote and use their voice. Especially in my generation, there's a lot of people who don't see the power of voting. For me, I do.

“I don't think it will affect me when I'm playing. It's November 5, so 6 here, it will be a very anxious day that day.”

At 20 years old, Gauff was able to vote in a presidential election for the first time in her life. She has always been well-informed, though, when it comes to politics and social issues, and likes to do her part and speak up whenever needed.

“Obviously, I voted before in the past for more state, local elections, but first time voting for a presidential election. To be able to do your part felt really cool and empowering,” Gauff told The National at the WTA Finals.

Voting for the next US president is not the only bit of 'adulting' – as the kids call it these days – Gauff has been doing lately. She recently bought a house for herself and moved out from her parents’ home.

“Cheers to being a homeowner at 20. All glory to God,” Gauff posted on her Instagram, with a photo of her favourite room in her new place.

“I just felt like this was a time for me to move out,” Gauff revealed.

“But I'm still in the same city as my parents, and my parents have a court at home, so I practise there still. So it feels somewhat the same.

“Obviously, I'm living alone, so I'm just trying to learn how to cook more, something I never really had to do living with both parents who like to cook. So it's been something that I've been experimenting with, and had some mostly successes, some failures.”

Gauff broke out on to the tennis scene when she was just 15 years old, storming through to the Wimbledon fourth round, as a qualifier, and defeating her idol Venus Williams en route.

She became a grand slam champion at 19 – last year at the US Open – and has qualified for the WTA Finals as one of the best eight players in the world for a third consecutive season.

Experiencing so much success at such a young age means Gauff has had to mature way faster than others of her generation and deal with way more scrutiny as well.

If Gauff has a bad serving day, the internet goes up in arms against her. If her forehand isn’t firing, the critical tweets pour in.

In the Netflix documentary, Starting 5, which follows five NBA players throughout the 2023-24 season, Boston Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla was asked about the unfair criticism his star forward Jayson Tatum has to deal with. Mazzulla cuts off the interviewer to correct them and say, “gets to deal with”, not “has to deal with”.

Mazzulla described that criticism as the “ultimate compliment”, which comes with wanting to be one of the greats. Gauff’s sentiments regarding her own experience facing criticism echoes that mentality.

“I honestly think maybe just because of how I entered the scene – people are very critical of me. I take it as a compliment,” she said.

“Maybe they're critical about people that they feel like can do better, so I just try to be better.

“I feel like, just certain comments, I guess maybe another player would maybe do the same result as me and I get crucified for it and they get applauded. So it's tough sometimes.

“And sometimes I do want to clap back, but I just try to remember, when I win, I’ll be like, that's going to be my clap back. So I do see it. It does motivate me.”

This 2024 campaign has come with lots of lessons learnt for Gauff, who entered the summer having to defend titles in Washington DC, Cincinnati, and the US Open.

She wasn’t able to replicate her results from last season on home soil but rebounded nicely in October with a solid Asian swing that included a WTA 1000 title run in Beijing and a semi-final showing in Wuhan.

“Just learning to deal with pressure, which is something I've always dealt with, but obviously, because of all my results last year and winning the US Open and coming in as defending grand slam champion, I put a lot of pressure on myself. And I realised it's not that serious,” said Gauff, when asked about her biggest lessons from 2024.

“You're always going to be defending something. If you want to win, you're going to be defending the next year. So I think for me, I just kind of try to treat it as like an evolutionary process.

“And also learn – again, I learnt this last year, I could turn my season around any moment, and I had to relearn it again this year. So some lessons, I guess you have to keep learning until they stick. So hopefully this time it sticks, but probably not,” she adds with a chuckle.

Gauff was recently tagged in a social media post by Venus Williams, who was celebrating the 30-year anniversary of her pro debut. In her post, Williams wrote about bringing “beads, braids, and the beginning of a game never seen before in tennis”.

She said that day changed her life and although she didn’t know it at the time, at just 14 years old, it would change the lives of many others as well. She tagged her younger sister Serena, Gauff, and Naomi Osaka, who are all women of colour who no doubt benefitted from Venus’ legacy.

“Obviously I'm someone who wears braids a lot, and seeing that she was able to do that 30 years ago, maybe where the space wasn't as receptive of this type of hair, is important,” said Gauff.

“Just her legacy, I hope to do half of what she's done for, not only just tennis, but prize money equality, women's equality, racial equality, all of that. She's someone that I look up to a lot when it comes to that.”

In line with that, Gauff has been vocal about the positives that can come out of the WTA’s first venture into Saudi Arabia.

She believes bringing the world’s best female tennis players to the kingdom can help empower young girls and women, and while she acknowledges a tournament can’t change everything, it can be the start of subsequent change.

Gauff fielded multiple questions this week in Riyadh from journalists representing western media, who view the WTA’s move to stage its crown jewel tournament in Saudi Arabia as controversial.

Gauff’s responses were measured, and focused on wanting to experience Saudi for herself, instead of relying on other people’s accounts.

There can be a double standard when it comes to how western media discusses issues in the Middle East while ignoring controversial matters taking place in their home countries, and Gauff says she is “very aware of it”.

“Being a person of colour, living especially where I live, it's definitely a double standard. Like I feel it, and not even being from here, but just even as a tennis player in this space, I feel like people are over critical of me because of that,” said Gauff.

“I don't like to always deep dive into it, because then it opens a lot of doors. But yes, I do feel that. And yes, I do know, being from especially America, like we’re not saints either.

“So I do think that in general, it is a very over critical situation. And for me, I have no problem with criticism, but you have to be able to see your own faults.

“That's why I think for me, when I made the decision to come here [to Saudi Arabia], I wanted to see how it is for myself. And when you look at history, and you look at the changes that have been made, there's always going to be backlash and opposition to it.

“If you look at almost every groundbreaking decision in history, it started with some sort of change. And sports is the most peaceful and easiest way to just start that.

“Obviously, we're not going to change everything, but it's the start and it’s the seed that’s being planted and hopefully we’ll see the tree grow.”

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