Coco Gauff dumped out in Cincinnati Open comeback clinic by Jasmine Paolini

Coco Gauff is out of the Cincinnati Open after Jasmine Paolini produced an epic comeback to down the top American 2-6, 6-4, 6-3 overcoming an ankle injury and a lapse of focus to secure an incredible win. It was a third win over Gauff in 2025 for the Italian.

Paolini seems as of late to be finding the form that saw her emerge as one of the best players in women's tennis last year reaching two Grand Slam finals and while it either stays in regards to results or it ultimately plummets due to the fact that it is hard to maintain, she has stayed around and has shown she is not a flash in the pan.

Even with coaching changes and form issues at times, she always seems to come back firing and she did against Gauff. Paolini rolled her ankle which hitting a running forehand at the start of the second set. She got back up though and shrugged off any discomfort to break Gauff's serve.

She then lost nine straight points from 3-1 40-30 in the decider to seemingly hand Gauff a lifeline but just as Paolini started to fall asleep she revived herself. She won seven points on the run and 12 of the last 15 to win he fifth semi-final of the season. It is a second also at WTA 1000 level after much success in Rome in May. Gauff though was poor at times and shouldn't have been in the game had it not been for Paolini's erratic nature. She hit 16 double faults and 62 unforced errors in two hours and three minutes. It was a match too that saw a combined 14 breaks of serve so while Gauff wasn't great, neither was Paolini but she got over the line.

"It was so tough," Paolini said afterwards. "At the beginning, I was just running and trying to put the ball inside the court ... but after a little bit, I started to feel better the ball. I stayed there every point, I tried to fight every point, and it worked. I tried to fight every point & it worked. I’m really happy. Thank you for cheering for me.. because we are in the States.. Coco is from here. Thank you as well for cheering for me.”

Next up for Paolini is Veronika Kudermetova. "She's a great player, big serve and big weapons," Paolini said. "It's always tough to play against her ... this one is going to be a different story. She's playing really well, I'm happy with my game here, so let's see what I can do and hopefully it's going to be a good one."

She has lost three straight matches against Kudermetova albeit they have not actually played since 2021 so in reality it is a fresh match-up. Also Kudermetova is a different player with the Russian having a resurgence as of late after a downturn in form and ranking plummet. It is a first WTA 1000 semi-final since 2023 for Kudermetova.

She was semi helped in part by the fact that she was facing Varvara Gracheva in her Quarter-Final and now Paolini is through it has opened the draw open somewhat. On the other half it is Iga Swiatek v Elena Rybakina in the landmark clash of the semi-finals and where the winner should on paper come from for the tournament. But as Paolini and Kudermetova have shown this week, count me out at your peril.