Gauff Loses Big Lead Late In Decider In Shock Loss To Keys At Madrid Open

Coco Gauff lost a big lead in the third set of her match at the 2024 Madrid Open against Madison Keys, and she also lost the match.

As expected, this turned out to be a pretty complicated matchup for Gauff. Keys produced a pretty solid effort, playing at a great level, which obviously was good enough to trouble the 20-year-old.

The conditions in the Spanish capital certainly played a factor in this match, though Gauff helped in some ways as well. The first set depended on the player's trading breaks, showcasing that this match would have a decent number of twists and turns.

Gauff jumped ahead later on, taking a 5-2 lead, but then lost her serve just when she was trying to serve it out. The trend continued beyond 5-5 as she dropped her serve once again, but still, the set reached the tie-break.

Keys was the better player in that, winning it 7-4, allowing Keys some momentum, which obviously came back to bite her. A large part of her troubles in that set was the serve, as she totaled six double faults.

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The second set was better in that regard, as she only had two. She put a lot of pressure on Keys, breaking her three times, but she also got broken twice, so the final score of the second set was 6-4 for the younger American.

Gauff never looked too comfortable in that match, but to her credit, she was able to be on the initiative most of the time. Keys is just a tough player to beat, and she showed that in the third set when she turned a 2-4 deficit into a 5-4 lead and built a 40-0 lead on Gauff's serve to have three match points.

From there, Keys was able to finish off the match, using her second match point, winning 7-6(4), 4-6, 6-4, completely turning around the deciding set.

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