By Richard Pagliaro | @Tennis_Now | Thursday, May 1, 2025

Red clay courts were career sinkholes for Coco Gauff against Iga Swiatek.

Swiatek spent every meeting shoving Gauff into deep ditches sweeping all 10 of their clay-court sets.

Today, Gauff went scorched earth unleashing a stunning thrashing for her . third straight win over Swiatek.

Serving with authority, Gauff rampaged through 11 consecutive games, destroying the defending champion 6-1, 6-1 to roll into her maiden Mutua Madrid Open final.



This was a brilliant beat down: one of the best clay-court matches of Gauff’s career on one of Swiatek's worst days on dirt.

In the end, it was a perfect storm as Gauff charged into her third career clay-court final. 

"Obviously she is very talented and can make you run and move you around the court," Gauff told the media in Madrid. "And I just tried to not do that today, which is what I did all the times that I, or tried to do all the times that I played her.

"Obviously I've gotten a lot better since maybe our first couple times playing each other, and obviously the results are showing that. Not that she hasn't gotten better either, obviously she's doing great, too. I just feel like it's one of those days you just step on court and everything feels good, and today was that day for me."

A stylish obliteration of the game’s premier clay-court player is Gauff’s fourth straight win against Top 2-ranked opponents, moves her to within 171 ranking points of surpassing Swiatek for No. 2 in the live rankings and sends her into the Madrid final.

The 21-year-old American will face either world No. 1 and two-time champion Aryna Sabalenka in a rematch of the 2023 US Open final or 17th-ranked Elina Svitolina, who is coming off her 18th title and has not surrendered a set in this tournament.

Consider Gauff has won 21 of her last 24 games dismissing Swiatek today one round after she deconstructed Indian Wells champion Mirra Andreeva 7-5, 6-1 yesterday.

In a rematch of the 2022 Roland Garros final, Gauff completely flipped the script on Swiatek’s past dirt dominance.

Prior to today's semifinals, Gauff's forehand had been Swiatek's personal pinata on red clay.

By the time this drubbing was done, the 21-year-old Gauff had reversed the rivalry with her third consecutive straight-sets win over Swiatek.

Afterward, Swiatek called her performance "pretty bad" adding candidly, perhaps in a commentary on coach Wim Fissette's game plan or her own in ability to adjust, "for sure I didn't have a Plan B." 

"Honestly, there's nothing like to walk through because it was all pretty much the same from the beginning to the end," Swiatek told the media in Madrid. "I couldn't really get my level up. Coco played good, but, yeah, I think it's, you know, on me that I didn't really move well, I wasn't ready to play back the shots with heaviness, and, yeah, with that kind of game like, yeah, it was pretty bad."

Throwing down the thunder, Gauff served 62 percent, slammed seven aces, including successive aces to close the match, won 19 of 21 first-serve points and did not face a single break point in a 64-minute annihilation.

Talk about tipping the scales of a lopsided rivalry.

Swiatek, who started this crucial stretch of defending Madrid, Rome and Roland Garros, looked like a woman playing with the weight of the world on her shoulders. She took a lengthy bathroom break after dropping six games in a row to lose the opener, slammed a ball of the clay in disgust, was hit with a warning for her piercing shout and looked overwhelmed and out of answers during that 11-game free fall.

Across the net, Gauff was in free flow.

"For sure, you know, I didn't play well even on these matches that I won," said Swiatek, who was bageled in the first set of her quarterfinal conquest of Madison Keys yesterday. "I think I, you know, pushed kind of with my head, you know, for more than I even like should, tennis-wise.

"Today for sure everything kind of collapsed, you know, both tennis-wise and, yeah, I feel like I wasn't even in the right place with my feet, you know, before the shots. So, yeah, I wish I would have moved better, because I think that would get me, you know, any opportunity to bounce back, because this is usually what happens. But today, yeah, for sure I didn't move well."

The biggest shock was the lopsided scoreline.

The second biggest surprise: Gauff shredded Swiatek’s vaunted forehand turning her vulnerability into a weapon.

From the first ball, Gauff came out going toe-to-toe in forehand crosscourt exchanges sending a statement to Swiatek: I will break your forehand before you bruise mine.

The second seed sprayed 21 forehand unforced errors—17 more forehand errors than Gauff, who played a cleaner match start to finish. In the past, Swiatek often forced Gauff to defend her weaker forehand wing off the back foot.

Today, Gauff's footwork was sharp and she looked committed into stepping into every shot driving the ball with commitment.

Pressuring the Pole from the opening game, Gauff broke in the third game.

Moving up to a mid-court ball, Swiatek lined up her forehand but failed to impart enough spin, struck the top of the tape and scattered it wide.

Showing sharper skills changing direction, Gauff attacked behind a fierce forehand down the line for break point. The second seed attacked again and Gauff wisely made the Pole play a volley. Swiatek shoveled a backhand volley wide as Gauff broke for 2-1.

You know Gauff is in rhythm on serve when she gets the ball, lines up, launches her body into her delivery. Wasting no time between points, Gauff whipped an ace out wide confirming the break for 3-1. Gauff won eight of the first 10 points played on her serve.

Swiatek punished the Gauff forehand in sweeping all 10 prior clay-court sets the pair had played.

In a seismic shift in game five, Gauff dug in and beat the Pole in crosscourt forehand exchanges. Trying to change direction to disrupt the pattern, Swiatek whacked a couple of wild forehand misses down the line as Gauff scored her second straight break at 15 for a 4-1 lead.

A commanding Gauff slashed successive aces sealing a love hold to back up the break and burst to a 5-1 lead after a mere 27 minutes of play.

Muttering misgivings to her box, Swiatek received direct advice from coach Wim Fissette “stick to the plan.”

On this day, Gauff blew up their blueprint.

Banging a backhand return, Gauff wrong footed Swiatek with a forehand strike for set point. Swiatek saved it, but sent a wild backhand down the line wide as Gauff scored her third consecutive break snatching her first-ever clay-court set from Swiatek on a six-game surge.

Confident forehands and a crackling serve set the tone for Gauff in the 34-minute first set.

The WTA Finals champion served 63 percent, whipped four aces and won all nine of her first-serve points.

Though Swiatek left the court for a seven-and-a-half minute bathroom break, Gauff banged her fifth ace to start the second set with her seventh game in a row.

A rattled Swiatek unraveled spitting up successive double faults as Gauff broke for the fifth time in a row rolling to a 6-1, 4-0 lead after 54-minutes.

As Swiatek turned her back to the court, murmurs of disbelief bubbled up from the crowd.



On this day, nothing could stall the Coco Express. Gauff threw down her third game-ending ace charging to a 5-0 lead. Including her 7-5, 6-1 sweep of Mirra Andreeva in yesterday’s quarterfinal, Gauff had won 21 of her last 23 games.

A confident Gauff rocketed aces to send the champion packing in 64 minutes.

Firing her topspin forehand with aggressive margin over net, Gauff controlled crosscourt rallies off both wings and let her first serve fly. "I think in the past I think I almost dialed in too much where I just like put so much pressure on myself," Gauff said. "I think I used to put too much pressure on myself when playing her, but now I just approach it like any other match and accept the result either way. I just try to make sure that when I play her, if I lose, it's because she won the match and not because I lost the match myself."

The fourth-seeded Gauff moves on in her quest to join Serena Williams as the second woman to win Madrid. Swiatek will try to pick up the pieces moving on to defend Rome and Paris a year removed from her last final at Roland Garros.