Coco Gauff was stunned by Paula Badosa at the Australian Open, ending her 13-match winning streak

CNN
—

Coco Gauff‘s fast start to the year ended at Australian Open as she fell to a 7-5, 6-4 quarterfinal loss to Paula Badosa.

The American was on a 13-match winning streak heading into Tuesday’s contest at Melbourne Park and appeared to have a strong chance of claiming his second grand slam title.

But despite a late break of serve offering a glimmer of hope, Gauff was undone by an inspired Badosa at Rod Laver Arena, with the Spaniard reaching the last four of a grand slam for the first time in his career.

“It’s tough right after and I’m still disappointed, but I think the way I played, even though it wasn’t my best, I gave everything on the pitch, so it’s something to be proud of,” Gauff told reporters.

“I fought until the end. Some fights are going to go my way, others don’t. I think it’s just one of those things that maybe a few years ago I would have felt a lot more broken and feeling like the world is coming to an end, the kind of sadness.”

Badosa, seeded 11^th at this year’s Australian Open, won a close first set after breaking Gauff’s serve at 5-5, producing a superb backhand volley and following it up with a crushing forehand winner on the next point.

The set was wrapped up soon after when she forced Gauff to push a forehand long – just the second time this tournament that the 20-year-old dropped a set.

With only one break of serve in the first set, the second was a different story. Badosa took an early lead after Gauff battled back from a series of forehand errors before the 2023 US Open champion hit back to level the set at 2-2.

But inconsistency continued to plague the American star’s forehand – she hit 41 unforced errors during the match – and she slipped to 5-2 on a double fault.

From there, Gauff began to find his range, although it turned out to be too little, too late. Badosa completed the upset with a forehand winner to secure his first win in a grand slam quarter-final at his third attempt.

After the fight, Badosa said she had considered retiring at one point last year due to a lingering back injury.

“The back didn’t react well and I didn’t find any solutions,” the 27-year-old told reporters. “But I wanted to give it one last shot, one last chance to finish the year and let’s see how it would go.

“And well, here I am. I’m really proud of what we went through with my whole team and especially how I fought through all of that, especially mentally.”

Badosa will now face two-time defending champion Aryna Sabalenka in Thursday’s semi-final after the Belarusian’s 6-2, 2-6, 6-3 victory over Russia’s Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova.