“Slow,” Gauff said during her on-court interview, then sort of suppressed a smile and paused for effect, drawing laughter from a packed Arthur Ashe Stadium crowd that rattled her opponent, Laura Siegemund.
What Gauff meant was the pace of Siegemund, a 35-year-old qualifier from Germany who took her sweet time between points and never seemed ready to play when the 19-year-old from Florida was. The sixth-seeded Gauff also could have been referring to her own start to the match, one she eventually turned around and won 3-6, 6-2, 6-4 to reach the second round at Flushing Meadows.
“I was really patient the whole match. She was going over the time since the first set. I never said anything. I would look at the umpire, and she didn’t do anything,” said Gauff, who got into a lengthy discussion with official Marijana Veljovic in the third set. “Then obviously the crowd started to notice that she was taking long, so you would hear people in the crowd yelling, ‘Time!’”