Aryna Sabalenka couldn't hold back her emotions after losing to Coco Gauff in the French Open, falling in a three-set thriller (6-7, 6-2, 6-4) in Saturday's final in Paris.
While Gauff had nothing but classy words for Sabalenka after her win, the world No. 1 didn't exactly return the favor. During her podium speech, Sabalenka did congratulate her adversary on a "well deserved" victory and called Gauff the better player given the windy conditions.
Later, though, Sabalenka lamented her own bad game in a postgame press conference and harped on the fact that had she not made so many unforced errors (70 to Gauff's 30), the French Open title would be hers.
“What happened when you led 4-1? Do you think Coco got better or the conditions got tougher?” One reporter asked Sabalenka, via The Tennis Letter.
"I think it was more windy. Also I think I was over emotional," Sabalenka said. "Today I didn’t handle myself quite well mentally. Basically that’s it. I was just making unforced errors. I don’t know. I have to check the statistics. I think she won the match not because she played incredible. Just because I made all of those mistakes, if you look from the outside, from kind of easy balls."
Sabalenka added that it was her worst performance in months and went on to make a bold statement: that Iga Swiatek (who Sabalenka defeated in the French Open semifinal) would have beaten Gauff in the final.
"If Iga had beaten me the other day, I think she’d come out today and get the win," Sabalenka said.
That's an interesting opinion, given that Gauff easily defeated Swiatek (6-1, 6-1) just a month ago in the Madrid Open.
Ultimately, one could chalk up Sabalenka's gripes as coming someone who wasn't at all satisfied with her own play on the court. Sabalenka also lost to Gauff in the U.S. Open final in 2023, when she similarly took the first set but lost the final two.
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Aryna Sabalenka Had Blunt Quote About Losing to Coco Gauff in French Open.