
Frances Tiafoe is no longer the only professional tennis player to walk on court for a match without racquets this season. His friend and WTA star Coco Gauff joined the club Tuesday at Roland Garros.
Less than three months after Tiafoe forgot his racquets for a match at the BNP Paribas Open against Damir Dzumhur, Gauff did the same against Olivia Gadecki in Paris. Both Americans emerged victorious.
"Honestly, as long as I’ve been on Tour, my coach has always put the racquets in the bag before the match because he’s very superstitious, so he likes to grip each racquet new each day," Gauff said in her on-court interview. "I don’t care, I can play with a dirty grip. And so I go on the court and I realise I have no racquets, and I literally just made fun of Frances for it in Madrid. But now I’ll be quiet."
It did not take long for Tiafoe to get on Gauff's case about the funny mishap.
"@cocogauff you gotta get more professional I'd never do something like this," Tiafoe joked on Instagram.
"Can't believe I'm in the same stat line as @bigfoe1998 smh 🤦🏾♀️," Gauff replied.
Tiafoe, the 15th seed, will face former No. 10 in the PIF ATP Rankings Pablo Carreno Busta in the second round Wednesday. It will be the pair's first Lexus ATP Head2Head meeting since 2018 in Estoril, where Tiafoe won.