An emphatic Elina Svitolina thrashes a dreadful Coco Gauff in under an hour to set up Sabalenka semi-final clash

Elina Svitolina has reached a fourth Grand Slam semi-final, and the first in the Australian Open after thrashing a hugely underwhelming Coco Gauff 6-1, 6-2.

The world number three was nowhere near her best form, with her problems with serve and forehand being shown greatly throughout the match. For someone who normally finds her best level for matches like this was nowhere near the level to compete, with a brilliant Svitolina pouncing on this.

She was ruthless throughout, not allowing Gauff a chance to breathe. Her attacking style of play was an important tactical tweak to compound the weaknesses in Gauff's game, and it worked a treat. She now re-enters the top 10 and is still unbeaten in 2026.

Gauff won just 41% of her first serve points, and 18% from second serves in a dreadful return. As well as that, she managed just three winners compared to 26 unforced errors. She won just two service games, both coming in the second set, and created two break points, both coming in the second game.

Svitolina boasted a much better variety of numbers. She won 71% of first serve points, hit 12 winners and 16 unforced errors, miles better than her off-par opponent.

Svitolina had a clear gameplan from the start: get out aggressive and strike back hard at Gauff. She started events with a break of serve, already pouncing on the one main vulnerability of the Gauff game. However, the American is also a fighter, and very resilient. She clinches a break at the second opportunity to get back into it but lost four points on the spin to fall a break behind again.

The signs were there early that the Gauff game was not at the standards expected, but Svitolina was on fire. She got the first hold of the match before breaking to love. Gauff's first winner of the match came in the sixth game where she went 15-30 ahead but was not able to do anything about the charging Svitolina. She wrapped up the first set which just lasted 29 minutes.

The 21-year-old produced five double faults in the first set, with a couple of them coming very late on to hand the set to her opponent. She could not find her best form in a very gruelling first set, with her utilising a toilet break to give her some time to cool down and re-think as she looked to get back into the match.

Svitolina continued to race away, A comfortable hod was followed by a commanding break to love. This was the start of her winning 10 points in a row. Gauff went over to her players box to get some advice from her team, which helped as she halted this drought but still had to face a break point. She survived this and got a first hold of serve in the match.

After a floury of breaks, there would just be holds for the rest of the match. This took the quarter-final to 5-2, with Svitolina having no problem in seeing the match out. It was delight for the Ukrainian who will have a tie against the world number one Aryna Sabalenka for a maiden Grand Slam final. For Gauff, it was too much to take as she slammed her racket in the floor in complete and utter frustration and disgust for what she produced on court.