Coco Gauff is making a coaching change as the 2024 WTA season winds down and she begins to turn her focus to 2025.
Brad Gilbert signaled in a post on X he’s no longer working with the 2023 U.S. Open champion:
The Athletic’s Charlie Eccleshare confirmed the change with Gauff’s representation and reported Gilbert “said he was happy with his tweet when contacted for further comment.”
Gilbert, who famously coached Andre Agassi and Andy Roddick, joined Gauff’s team midway through the 2023 season. His arrival seemed to pay immediate dividends as she won the DC Open and Cincinnati Open before reigning supreme in New York City.
This year started off reasonably well for Gauff. She reached the semifinals of the Australian Open, BNP Paribas Open and French Open. By mid-June, she climbed to No. 2 in the world.
However, a fourth-round exit at Wimbledon at the hands of Emma Navarro triggered a bit of a slide in the second half.
Gauff got bounced in the third round of the women’s singles tournament in the Summer Olympics and lost her second matches in the women’s and mixed doubles events. Lackluster finishes at the National Bank Open and Cincinnati Open then preceded another Grand Slam loss to Navarro at the U.S. Open.
Her comments after her Wimbledon defeat are telling in the wake of Wednesday’s news.
“We had a game plan going in, and I felt that it wasn’t working,” she said. “I don’t always ask for advice from the box, but today was one of those moments where I felt like I didn’t have solutions. Mentally it was a lot going on, and I felt like I wanted more direction.”
The China Open gets underway next week and the WTA Finals are scheduled to start Nov. 2 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Gauff still has an opportunity to end her campaign on a high. But her change in coaches points to how she’s already looking much further than that.
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