Emotions in sports can be directly correlated with performance, and according to Coco Gauff, she wants to impart this during her matches.
Gauff, who is one of the rising stars of women's tennis, spoke in detail about her personality, and how people often perceive her in person and during matches. After interacting with many faces while touring the world, including fellow coaches and pros, Gauff learned to embrace emotions both positively and negatively.
The 19-year-old is usually one of the calmest and coolest heads in matches. Gauff isn't fond of exploding after a winning shot, or blabbering to her team when things are not working. Gauff admits that the best part of having fun is letting loose your emotion.
She attributes to both positive and negative emotions if that meant she would have fun while playing. She explains that letting her emotions build up becomes detrimental and she wants to incorporate a sense of freedom, even if that meant breaking her racket to let loose of emotions.
"Honestly, like, after Wimbledon, I talked to a lot of people, and the main thing was they were, like, You need to have more fun on the court and allow yourself to have more fun. Because I think when I speak to different people in person, they realize that I actually have a personality more so what I look like on the court."
"Even with Pere (coach), he told me, Man, when I didn't know you, I just thought you were just closed off and everything, but you're really fun and you like to joke. Even with Brad, he's, like, I want you to smile at the box sometimes and talk to us. This was even before I even decided to work with him."
Gauff also thinks that watching flamboyant players like Frances Tiafoe has inspired her in that regard, and talks of just how impactful transferring the emotional side of things from practice to matches.
"Yeah, I want to do that and have fun. I think watching Frances and people like him, I don't think I will ever be able to be on the scale as him, but there's moments, because I do it in practice. I'm, like, Well, if I'm having fun in practice, I should in the match and allow myself to experience the good and bad emotions."
"I realize these emotions are building up and I'm not having fun. So now I'm just, like, I'm going to let it happen and play into the crowd. Because when I'm watching as a fan, I love it. As a player, I want to do it. But before I would just shut myself down. Now I'm just, like, I really want to have fun playing tennis, and I think I lost that for a little bit, but I'm really finding it."
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