Adriano Panatta fiercely attacks Coco Gauff and women’s tennis
Live on Rai, after Jasmine Paolini’s triumph at the Internazionali d’Italia, Adriano Panatta, the iconic man of Italian tennis, launched an unbelievable attack against Coco Gauff, who lost the Foro Italico final to the 29-year-old Tuscan, and against the vast majority of female tennis players, guilty in his opinion of being able to play only one way. Here are his words.
“Jasmine Paolini is an extraordinary player. Ninety-five percent of female players shoot hard and don’t think. They need to learn how to play tennis. Paolini is a great player, she does not have a Junoesque physique but she is a valkyrie of heart. She won with intelligence, Gauff lost without intelligence. They are tennis players made in a laboratory, she never changes her expression during the match. She, or those around her, don’t understand that you have to change the way you play. A player of that level, No. 3 in the world and potentially No. 1, should change coaches”.
“Gauff, like many top athletes today, is ‘programmed’ to play on concrete. “Learning how to play on clay doesn…Gauff made a short ball that I haven…t seen even in the clubhouse done by two old ladies… They only teach now to shoot hard without thinking. Ninety-five percent of the female players play like Gauff, the one who makes the least mistakes wins: it…s boring. I enjoy watching Paolini because she thinks and makes these players play ‘bad’… whatever, players… only capable of playing one way…”.
“Do they only know how to play one way? Then let them stay on concrete and not come here. If she wants to be a true champion, a tennis player must be able to play on any surface. Among men, the big guys win everywhere. Among women then the ranking is false… They would make a cement-only circuit for these female tennis players. They all play the same way, they pull hard even impressively. In tennis, however, there’s the net and there are lines: it is not enough to shoot hard, you have to learn how to play tennis”.
