LONDON: Less than a week after capturing her second Tour-level title on the grass, Jessica Pegula has suffered a shock first round exit from Wimbledon.
The American world No.3 was swept aside during a one-sided 6-2, 6-3, defeat at the hands of Italy’s Elisabetta Cocciaretto. Pegula struggled to find her range on the court and was outmanoeuvred numerous times. Hitting a costly 24 unforced errors compared to only five winners. She also struggled behind her second serve, winning just 42% of those points.
“Do I think I played the best match ever? No, but I definitely don’t think I was playing bad. It wasn’t like I was playing that bad,” Pegula said of her latest performance.
“She was just hitting her shots and going for it, serving big, serving high percentage, going for big second serves and redirecting the ball. It was just her day.”
“I tried my best to try and match her level. I thought I was going to be able to do it there, at least in the second (set) and maybe if she dropped a little bit. She didn’t really drop her level at all.
“That’s the most frustrating part is that I wasn’t able to figure it out, which I feel like I should be able to. So that’s always disappointing.“
Coming into Wimbledon, the 31-year-old looked to be in fine form after beating top 10 players Emma Navarro and Iga Swiatek en route to the Bad Homburg Open title less than a week ago. Although she did lose her opening match at another grasscourt event in Berlin earlier in the season.
Pegula took to the court wearing a substantial amount of strapping around her left knee. Did this have any impact on her latest result?
“The knee feels good. There wasn’t really anything bothering me,” she stated.
“I’m managing it pretty well. I think it’s not holding me back.
“I had a little bit of a neck injury as well that’s been on and off this year. But at the same time, being able to play the last few weeks and get my body acclimated to the grass, it’s actually felt really good.
“So I feel good. That’s why it’s kind of disappointing that I’m not able to keep it going here (at Wimbledon).”
Losing in the first round of a major is a rare occurrence for Pegula. Before Wimbledon, the last time this happened was in 2020. Her best result at The All England Club was making it through to the quarter-finals in 2023.
“I used to kind of have trouble getting past the first round for a while. I remember I had a really tough match. I just told myself, I’m done losing first round, I’m not losing first round. I’ve been able to flip that mentality and have great results at slams and be really consistent at slams,” she reflected.
“For this to happen today, it’s disappointing. I’m upset that I wasn’t able to turn anything around. “But at the same time, I do feel like she played kind of insane.
“The bonus is I can go prep for the hard courts, which seems to be my favourite surface.”
