Coco Gauff’s coach Brad Gilbert has declared that the American shares a “big-time trait” with tennis legend Andre Agassi in that she is a “crazy perfectionist.”
The legendary coach revealed he told Gauff that the pursuit of perfection “doesn’t exist” and “makes you miserable” and feels the mindset “costs you a lot of matches.”
Gilbert has helped Gauff reach new heights since joining her coaching team ahead of the Citi Open in Washington last year — where the 19-year-old won the event without dropping a set.
With the 62-year-old American in her corner, Gauff then added her first WTA 1000 title in Cincinnati and claimed her maiden Grand Slam crown at the 2023 US Open in September.
The 19-year-old star is currently at a career-high WTA ranking of world No 3 and started her 2024 season by defending her title in Auckland and reaching the Australian Open semi-finals.
The American, who fell in the opening round in Doha and the quarter-finals in Dubai at her two events last month, is set to compete at the Indian Wells Open, where play begins today.
Tennis icon Andre Agassi won six of his eight Grand Slam titles under Gilbert’s guidance and once described him as the “greatest coach of all-time.”
READ MORE: Darren Cahill and Brad Gilbert: the tennis super coaches guiding Jannik Sinner and Coco Gauff to glory
Gilbert highlighted Gauff’s perfectionism in an interview for a Vogue feature on Gauff, who is the cover star for the latest edition of the fashion magazine.
“Coco definitely shares a big-time trait with Andre Agassi in that she’s a perfectionist. Crazy perfectionist,” the former world No 4 explained.
“That’s probably the thing from early on I noticed instantly. And I told her, ‘The pursuit of perfection doesn’t exist. It makes you miserable, chasing it. And you’re never satisfied with being good.’
“She’s just always gotta be better. Andre was the same. And it’s like, ‘You only gotta be better than the lady on the other side of the net.’ That’s it. This whole being-better-than-you-need-to-be costs you a lot of matches.”
The 20-time ATP titlist also gave insight into his approach to coaching Gauff and divulged how he felt the 19-year-old needed to take a different direction tactically than she had previously.
“I’ll call it turning the dial a little bit on the radio. I felt like there were little, subtle tweaks that were going to make a big difference,” Gilbert said.
“The way she had been coached was, they wanted her to be a power player. They wanted her to go through people. I didn’t see it that way. Her serve, her backhand, her insanely great movement, her defending skills.”
Gilbert also coached Andy Roddick to the 2003 US Open title and the world No 1 ranking.
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