Jimmy Connors blasts Coco Gauff and Jessica Pegula for failure to win any match at the 2022 WTA Finals
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Coco Gauff, Jessica Pegula, Jimmy Connors
Jimmy Connors, an 8-time Grand Slam champion and a former World No. 1, to date remains the most successful player on the Tour in terms of titles won in singles. Connors is a winner of 109 singles titles in the Open Era with only Roger Federer with his 103 titles in the 100-titles club.
The American great turned to coaching as well after finishing his career of 24 years and joined Andy Roddick‘s camp. The pair were together for 19 months on the Tour where he guided Roddick to the finals of the 2006 US Open. Connors also coached Maria Sharapova but the arrangement lasted for only 1 match.
Connors currently runs a podcast with his son Brett, titled ‘Advantage Connors‘. On the latest episode of the podcast, Connors spoke about Coco Gauff and Jessica Pegula‘s performance at the 2022 WTA Finals.
The Americans qualified in singles and also in doubles on the back of their brilliant performances this season. The results in Finals were however disappointing as neither of them won a single match at the event.
“If you’re gonna play, be ready to play and go and play. Don’t say you’re tired, because if you are tired, then don’t play. These kids have so many people around and they should know that’s what they pay them for, to do the best. It’s like I told Andy when we had this chat.
“I said, ‘I never told you one thing that was gonna hurt you. Everything that I was telling you was for your benefit, and I wanted you to win just as much as you wanted to win.’ That’s the way all the people around either it’s Coco Gauff or Jessica Pegula or whoever has to look at it. Tennis is a 24×7, 365 days a year job and if you’re not willing to do that, take what you get,” said Connors on the podcast.
Coco Gauff misses out on the chance to finish inside the Top 5 while Jessica Pegula secures a Top 3 finish
The poor outing in Fort Worth was quite damaging for Gauff as compared to Pegula. Pegula’s 3 defeats did not hurt her much as she finishes the season ranked World No. 3 with 4691 points. She could have made the jump to World No. 2 with a good performance, she does end her year with the best career ranking. In doubles, however, Pegula slipped 3 places to finish as World No. 6.
As for Gauff, the teenager stood a great chance to end the season as World No. 1 in doubles having secured the rank earlier in the season. She was ranked 2nd going into the Finals but ended up as World No. 4 going into the next season. In singles, Gauff stumbles down to World No. 7 losing 3 places from when she entered the WTA Finals.
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Sarthak Shitole
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