Gauff starts US Open defence with routine win

Defending champion Coco Gauff says she is treating this year's US Open as a "victory lap" after comfortably beating Varvara Gracheva in her opening match.

Gauff, 20, began her title defence with a 6-2 6-0 victory in just 66 minutes on Arthur Ashe Stadium.

The American beat Aryna Sabalenka in last year's final to win her first Grand Slam and followed that by reaching the semi-finals of the Australian Open and French Open this year.

But she has struggled for form recently, losing in the third round of the Paris Olympics before suffering early exits at tournaments in Cincinnati and Toronto.

Gauff said the past few weeks have "been a little bit tough", but she believed her performance against Gracheva was "the best tennis I have played in a while".

She added that a fan's comment on her TikTok account had helped change her perspective coming into the US Open.

"Someone commented on my TikTok saying you've won in life, literally and figuratively, and there's no point in piling pressure on yourself on a victory lap," Gauff said in her on-court interview.

"I'm just treating this tournament like that and if you defend something that means you won something."

Gauff, who fired down 10 aces, broke Gracheva's serve twice in the opening set and won the last nine games on her way to an emphatic victory.

She will face German veteran Tatjana Maria in the second round after the 37-year-old moved past Argentine qualifier Solana Sierra 6-2 6-3.

Olympic champion Zheng Qinwen fought back from a set down to beat world number 50 Amanda Anisimova 4-6 6-4 6-2 on Louis Armstrong Stadium.

Anisimova raced into a 5-1 lead early on but twice failed to serve out the first set, before breaking Chinese seventh seed Zheng for the third time in the match to eventually take it 6-4.

But Zheng, a little over three weeks on from her Olympic triumph in Paris, recovered well and served superbly from then on to close out victory.

Daria Kasatkina, the 12th seed, beat Romania's Jaqueline Cristian 6-2 6-4 to progress to round two, while Ukraine's 27th seed Elina Svitolina came through in three sets against Maria Lourdes Carle of Argentina.

Ninth seed Maria Sakkari of Greece is out, though, retiring injured after losing the first set of her first-round match to Wang Yafan.

Sakkari received treatment from the trainer to her shoulder and neck midway through the first set, and was unable to continue into a second.

Second seed Sabalenka plays in the evening session against qualifier Priscilla Hon of Australia.

Australian Open champion Sabalenka pulled out of Wimbledon earlier this summer because of a shoulder injury and then missed the Olympics to "take care of her health".

Sloane Stephens, the 2017 winner, starts the evening session on Arthur Ashe Stadium against Clara Burel of France (00:00 BST).

World number one Iga Swiatek and Great Britain's Emma Raducanu, the 2021 US Open champion, are among the players scheduled to be in first-round action on Tuesday.