Naomi Osaka vs Coco Gauff: Six years after their emotional US Open clash, two fan favourites renew a rivalry that was not meant to be

If the anticipation was that the match would spur a rivalry for the future, that could not be further from later reality. Gauff slowly mounted her ascension to the top of the women’s game while Osaka’s career appeared to be tapering off after dealing with mental health issues and a 16-month break for pregnancy and childbirth. With their careers diverging, it became a rivalry that was not meant to be. But six years later, the New York stars have aligned once again.

With Osaka having gradually, and sometimes frustratingly so, moved up the rankings with incremental improvements in her game fitness, she has lived up to her big billing by reaching the second week of a Major for the first time since her title triumph at the Australian Open in 2021. There, late on Monday at Flushing Meadows’ showpiece arena for the early tournament’s showpiece fixture, she will meet Gauff, the third seed, who has had a whirlwind tournament of her own.

Gauff’s whirlwind week

This week in New York, above all else, the 21-year-old American, a two-time Major winner who won this tournament in 2023, has shown a spectacular appetite to gamble. Going through a coaching change to completely revamp her serve just one week ahead of her most important tournament of the year, under the watchful gaze of daily expectant crowds, has taken its toll on her.

She needed to grit and grind to come through in three sets in her opener against Australia’s Ajla Tomljanovic, and then broke down in tears midway through the first set of her second-round victory over Donna Vekic. A much-needed boring, dominant 6-3, 6-1 win was found against Poland’s Magdalena Frech on Saturday to finally set up a match where the expectations will not fall entirely on her.

Osaka still draws major attention from crowds that remember her from her pomp, and slowly yet surely, she has gone about rebuilding herself back to her best. There have been promising performances all year, which saw her get back into the top 25 in the rankings and be seeded in New York, and she seems to have built up her game in time for the season-ending Major. That was evident in her run to the final at the WTA 1000 event in Montreal this month.

The four-time Major winner’s work with Polish coach Tomasz Wiktorowski, whom she linked up with in July, seems to have spurred more confidence in her attack-first game. She opened her tournament with two routine straight-sets wins and was looking in fine form until slipping up when she was up a break in her third-round match against Daria Kasatkina on Saturday. She came back firing, raising her levels as a top player does, to return with the 6-0, 4-6, 6-3 victory.

In terms of a matchup, there’s plenty of intrigue in Osaka vs Gauff. A lot will centre around the indifferent form of Gauff with her reworked serve. At her best, Osaka was an elite returner, leathering shots back when her opponents missed their spots, something Gauff has notoriously done and put herself under pressure for all year.

The American, on the other hand, can retreat into lockdown mode and produce defensive masterclasses when put under pressure, which would really test the physical fitness and sharpness of Osaka, an element of her game that has been under the scanner for the last few years. Forehand and backhands may clash, returns and serves may vary, but the psychological edge may be key for two players who have often found their best while feeding off the New York crowd’s raucous energy.

“I remember it was a tough moment for me because it was a hyped-up match. I remember looking back at it. I guess I put way too much pressure on myself,” Gauff said about their 2019 encounter. “It would be a cool kind of deja vu type of situation, but hopefully it will be a different result.”

“Can someone come to the match and cheer for me?” Osaka quipped. “It’s tough playing an American here but I hope you guys have adopted me. I kind of see her as a little sister, so it’s cool to be playing her here.”