Former WTA player Pam Shriver praised Coco Gauff for her decision to retool her coaching team, which proved crucial for her tremendous breakout.
For much of her career, Coco Gauff was coached by her father. As she became better and better, Gauff started to work with other people, such as Patrick Mouratoglou, who also briefly served as her coach during the clay season this year.
The American didn't have a great time during that time and opted to retool her coaching team, allowing her father to step back and bringing in Pere Riba as the primary coach.
They clicked as both wanted her to be more of an attacking player, and with the inclusion of experienced voice Brad Gilbert, things simply went to another level.
She went supernova during the US Open stretch, ending up as the US Open champion with a 10+ match winning streak. It was a tremendous turnaround in just a couple of weeks, and some of the credit obviously belongs to the coaching team.
Shriver spoke about that in the Inside In podcast recently, praising her for the decision to try something new.
Well if you'd asked me that right after Wimbledon I would have had a totally different answer. The response that Coco and the team has had since Wimbledon by adding, I know Pere Riba was hired a little bit before Brad Gilbert.
To be able to merge those voices together and to have the presence of the dad to be able to step back from at least being in the box. I thought it was a very mature decision by Coco and her team to bring who they brought in.
We'll see whether she can sustain that next year, but for now, Gauff looks like one of the best players in the world.