Coco Gauff admits she is struggling in key area ahead of US Open as she looks to hit reset button

Coco Gauff’s US Open preparations suffered a massive setback as she made an early exit from the Cincinnati Open and the American admits she needs to up her game ahead of her title defence in New York.

The reigning US Open champion has not had a good run of late as she lost in the round of 16 at Wimbledon, the third round of the Olympics, the third round at the Canadian Open and now the second round in Cincinnati.

Gauff was the defending champion in Ohio and her defeat to 6-4, 2-6, 6-4 defeat to Yulia Putintseva means she will head into the US Open with only three matches (two in Toronto and one in Cincinnati) under her belt on hard courts.

JUST IN: Carlos Alcaraz ‘already like legends Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer’

That is a far cry from her 2023 form where she won the Washington DC title (Gauff skipped the Citi DC event this year due as it clashed with the Paris Olympics), reached the quarter-final in Canada and won the Cincinnati Open. Those results effectively set her up for her title run in New York.

The 20-year-old’s latest loss will also result in a drop to No 3 in the WTA Rankings and it means she will be seeded third in New York behind world No 1 Iga Swiatek and second seed Aryna Sabalenka.

Gauff admitted there is one thing she currently lacks.

“I feel like I have to work on consistency, overall,” she told the WTA Tour. “[I will] probably go home and try to reset.

“Obviously, I have a lot coming up soon with the US Open, so I think just trying to reset and be ready for that.”

Gauff served nine double faults with four of those coming in the deciding set with her first serve percentage at 56% while she won only 54% of her service points.

Despite her struggles, she broke to love in game six of the deciding set to 4-2 up, but Putintseva hit back immediately as the “tricky” Kazakh player won the final four games of the match.

“I made a lot of errors, especially when I was up 4-2 [in the third set]. I think most of the points she won were off my errors,” Gauff said.

“She’s always a tricky opponent to play. She mixes up the ball, has drop shots, slices. She’s someone that makes you earn the match.”