MELBOURNE, Australia — Coco Gauff has beaten Sorana Cirstea 4-6, 6-3, 7-5 to set up a third-round match against defending champion Naomi Osaka at the Australian Open.
The 15-year-old Gauff rallied after losing the first set and got the pivotal service break in the next-to-last game before serving out against 29-year-old Cirstea, who is playing at the Australian Open for a 12th time.
Gauff started the tournament with her second first-round win over Venus Williams in three majors, following her upset over the seven-time Grand Slam champion at last year’s Wimbledon.
Gauff reached the fourth round on her Wimbledon debut and the third round at the U.S. Open, before losing there to Osaka.
Osaka herself had some struggles on Day 3. She threw her racket, tossed a ball and kicked the racket again for good measure before sitting for a while with a towel over her head. She perhaps sensed that the crowd was looking for drama, and she provided a little bit.
Osaka then pulled it together quickly in a swirling breeze on Margaret Court Arena and beat Zheng Saisai 6-2, 6-4 to advance to the third round of the Australian Open.
On the adjoining show court at about the same time, 2019 runner-up Petra Kvitova held her composure when she faced three set points before winning 13 of the next 15 points to beat Paula Badosa 7-5, 7-5.
Both of last year’s finalists secured spots in the third round before some of the women completed their first-round matches in the singles draw. A backlog created by heavy rain on Day 1 caused a further spillover on Day 2.
On Day 3, the lineup on the show courts was full of major winners. French Open champion and No. 1-seeded Ash Barty beat Polona Hercog 6-1, 6-4 in the second match on Rod Laver Arena.
Caroline Wozniacki, the 2018 champion, continued her farewell tournament by overcoming a 5-1 first-set deficit and beating Dayana Yastremska 7-5, 7-5 on her sixth match point in the second round. Wozniacki plans to retire after this Australian Open.
She had three match points in the 10th game of the second set, but Yastremska held in a game after she’d taken a medical timeout to treat her left leg. Wozniacki clinched it two games later with a service break and wiped tears from her eyes. Former No. 1 Wozniacki will next play Ons Jabeur, who beat Caroline Garcia 1-6, 6-2, 6-3.
Osaka was unimpressed by her performance.
“I hope you guys like the tennis that’s coming after my match,” No. 3 Osaka told the crowd in an on-court interview, “because it wasn’t that pretty.”
She had her service broken three times, including in the second set, which caused the minor tantrum.
“I got really fired up when she was up … and people started clapping more,” Osaka said. Asked what the crowd was clapping for, she said, “For the drama. I was complaining here. I was almost throwing my racket over there.”
Osaka won back-to-back majors at the U.S. Open in 2018 and Australian Open in 2019. She was unable to successfully defend her U.S. title and is using that as a learning experience to counteract any nerves.
“I got that all out during the U.S. Open. Coming here, I think about it as a new tournament,” she said. “The only thing that has changed is maybe people want to beat me more.”
One of those is two-time Wimbledon champion Kvitova, who had a comeback run at Melbourne Park last year before losing the final. She said she had a few nerves in the second round and had some difficulty with the breeze but was otherwise OK.
“So far it’s good. Being in the third round of a Grand Slam [means] the tournament’s not ending,” she said.
Because of suspended matches from rain on Monday, eight first-round women’s singles matches were not completed Tuesday. There were several still in progress when Osaka and Kvitova went through.
Also advancing to the third round were No. 14-seeded Sofia Kenin, No. 18 Alison Riske, No. 25 Ekaterina Alexandrova and Julia Goerges, who beat 13th-seeded Petra Martic 4-6, 6-3, 7-5.
In first-round matches, 31-year-old Carla Suarez Navarro, a three-time quarterfinalist in Australia, upset 11th-seeded Aryna Sabalenka 7-6 (6), 7-6 (6), and Taylor Townsend beat fellow American Jessica Pegula 6-4, 7-6 (5) to move into a second-rounder against No. 30 Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.