‘Should Have Spoke Up Earlier’- After Furious Exchange With Umpire at US Open, Coco Gauff Justifies Her Unusually Aggressive Behavior

Coco Gauff kicked off her US Open campaign on a high note! The American ace won her first-round match with a rousing triumph over the German player Laura Siegemund. Returning from a set down, she expressed her emotions to the fullest. But the seventh-ranked tennis player grabbed a lot of headlines for another reason – lashing out at the chair umpire while carrying on an angry rant.

But now she has opened up about the reason why she spoke up against the chair umpire and provided a proper explanation. Let’s take a look at what was going on in Gauff’s mind that made her blast off in the middle of a crucial match, and that too in the first round of a major.

Coco Gauff presents her side of the picture

The 19-year-old tennis sensation’s first-round clash had a lot of dramatic components. Starting from the thrilling competition to having an angry outburst at the opponent, it was a full package of what a tennis game could possibly be. Yes, even though she achieved victory, during the match, there was a frustrated moment when she lashed out at the chair umpire against her German opponent.

During the post-match press conference, she sat down and gave a proper justification for her decision to not remain silent on the court.

Gauff said, “On her serve, even though you’re supposed to be on the time, I was being nice. My team told me I should have spoke up earlier. But then it got to the point where she was doing it a lot on my serve. My issue with that was the ref was calling the score like a couple seconds after the point was finished, so it made it look like I was serving abnormally fast.”

Although she claimed that she was quite calm during the whole match, the way the audience started to react to her delayed serve, somewhere got her. But then, somewhere else, she handled the matter and the match in her own way, having a successful first-round victory at the US Open.

READ MORE – ‘On the Fence’ Coco Gauff Gets Real About Receiving Major Blow Ahead of European Clay Summer – ‘Just Me and My Dad’

Nevertheless, now that the seventh-ranked tennis player has cleared her reason behind the rant, this was the same reason why she came up to the chair umpire even during the tennis match. However, last year she was also caught in an umpire controversy during the French Open tournament.

When Gauff got caught up in an umpire controversy 

During the French Open last year while she was playing against Canadian qualifier Rebecca Marino, she became the center of the controversy after she got a warning from the umpire. She was warned about receiving coaching from her father in between the match.

While the 19-year-old wasn’t impressed by the call, she had a little feud with the umpire Marijana Veljovic regarding how she is not receiving any coaching instructions from the stands. But this time, things are a little different, as she has given a proper justification for her anger.

Now that she has justified her unusual behavior, what is your take on the feud? Let us know in the comments.

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