Coco Gauff’s match against Linda Noskova was the American’s 64th of the season, with her 65th being scheduled against Marta Kostyuk on Thursday. The match against the Ukrainian might be Gauff’s last of the season, even if she wins, which is all down to the unique round-robin format of the WTA Finals. The World No. 4 was not overly impressed with the proceedings, while keeping her focus on winning her final group stage match.
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“The scenarios, I know they make sense, but they’re kinda stupid,” said Gauff during a post-match interview. “If I win my match and I still don’t qualify, I’m like, ‘It’s okay, it’s cool.’ I’m looking forward to next year. I can’t say much, but everybody knows that has to change.”
Gauff’s 3-6, 3-6 loss to Noskova on Tuesday has taken the qualification chances out of the 22-year-old’s control. Even if she wins her final match against Kostyuk, against whom she does have a 4-2 head-to-head record, the American will have to depend on what her compatriot, Jessica Pegula, does in her match against Noskova.
Should Pegula and Gauff both win their matches, it would be a three-way tie between the two Americans and Linda Noskova, all of whom would have a 2-1 win-loss record during the group stages. In such a situation, the percentage of sets won would be considered to determine who would go through. Gauff’s current set record is 2-3, and at best she could reach 4-3 or 4-4, depending on whether she beats Kostyuk in straight sets or in three.
On the other hand, Pegula has a 3-2 set record in the event and can reach up to 5-2 or 5-3, depending on her result against Noskova. This means that even if Pegula wins in three sets against Noskova, her set percentage would be 62.5, which would be more compared to Gauff’s 57.1 should she beat Kostyuk in straight sets. However, should Noskova prevail over Pegula in her match, a win over Kostyuk would be all it takes for Gauff to go through. The Czech does have a 3-1 head-to-head record against Pegula, and the World No. 4 would be hoping the reigning Wimbledon champion improves on that record.
If this were before 2003, Gauff would not need to consider so many calculations, as the WTA Finals up until that year were held in the standard knockout format with a 16-player draw, where one loss was enough to send a player packing. The Tour Finals also featured best-of-five-set matches from 1984 till 1998, which was only used in the final, a format that produced some classic contests, such as Monica Seles defeating Gabriela Sabatini in 1990 and Steffi Graf defeating Martina Hingis in 1998, both in five-set thrillers.
Gauff would also be wary of recent history, in which players have not made it past the group stage despite winning two of their three matches. Back at the 2024 edition, Iga Swiatek missed out on semifinal qualification after falling short of the set percentage criteria, as she was in a three-way tie with Barbora Krejcikova and Gauff herself.
For Gauff, losing that one set against Pegula might be the differentiator, as the American could not convert the match point, despite coming back from a 5-1 deficit. On the other hand, Noskova did not want to revel in her victory too much, keeping her focus on her next match.
Linda Noskova Refuses to Revel in Her Win Over Coco Gauff at the WTA Finals
A straight-sets win over Coco Gauff at the WTA Finals is a result that is massive for Linda Noskova, given that this is the first time that the Czech player has qualified for the Tour Finals, and the American is a former champion. However, given the year she is having, it is understandable that the World No. 8 holds herself to higher standards.
“I’m glad I got used to the conditions pretty well today,” said Noskova in a post-match interview. “I mean, the sun was obviously very tricky. But also, I would not say that it was one of the best matches I’ve played this year. You know, Coco, she’s a tricky player. Anything can happen. She’s definitely a big fighter. So I had to play since, you know, beginning till the very last match. So I was just focusing on that.”
Noskova is not the first player to point out the sun being a hurdle at Indian Wells. Even World No. 2, Aryna Sabalenka, pointed out the difficulty of serving with the sun in her eyes during her match against Karolina Muchova. Noskova did flounder a bit with her serve in the first set against Gauff, as the American was able to break the Czech’s serve twice. However, the World No. 4’s own serving game was not up to the mark, which saw Noskova break her opponent’s serve four times.
Once she got in her groove, there was no stopping Noskova, as she did not face a single break point in the second set. The World No. 8 was wary of Gauff’s ability to come back in matches and did not give a sniff of an opportunity to the home favorite.