American top favorite Gauff surprised by Shnaider in Toronto

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Reigning US Open champion Coco Gauff was defeated by Russian Diana Shnaider 6-4, 6-1 in the third round of the WTA Canadian Open on Friday.

Shnaider won her first match against a top 10 rival, winning the 20-year-olds’ encounter with world number two Gauff, the top-seeded American tennis player who was eliminated in an attempt to capture her eighth WTA title.

“I tried to act cool, but inside I was like, ‘Yeah, I made it,’” Shnaider said.

Asked how she managed the stunner, Shnaider replied: “Honestly, I still don’t know. It was a bit tricky conditions. It was very windy, but I’m very happy that I overcame it.”

The 24th-ranked Russian is chasing her fourth WTA title of the year, after Thailand, Bad Homburg and Budapest.

Shnaider was playing her first match in the round of 16 of the WTA Masters tournament and needed just 70 minutes to beat Gauff and book a quarter-final against sixth-seeded Russian Liudmila Samsonova, who knocked out Belgian Elise Mertens 6-2, 6-4.

Shnaider broke Gauff in the 10th game to take the first set. The American double-faulted to give Shnaider a 3-1 lead in the second set, which he never regained.

“Sometimes I wonder if I should have played or not,” Gauff said. “But at the end of the day, I wanted to test myself and see if I could do it, how I would do it if I was a little tired mentally and physically.

“I didn’t have high expectations, but I wish I had performed better today, even if it had resulted in a loss. I don’t think I performed well.”

Gauff will play next week in Cincinnati, where she is the reigning champion, in the last major tournament in preparation for the US Open.

American third seed and reigning champion Jessica Pegula defeated fellow American Ashlyn Krueger 6-2, 6-4 to reach the quarterfinals. They faced another American, Peyton Stearns, who advanced 6-4, 4-2 when 12th-seeded Victoria Azarenka withdrew.

In another quarterfinal, only the Americans will play: eighth-seeded Emma Navarro will face Taylor Townsend.

Navarro defeated 11th-seeded Ukrainian Marta Kostyuk 7-5, 7-5, while Townsend defeated fourth-seeded Latvian Jelena Ostapenko 6-2, 6-1.

Two-time reigning Australian Open champion Aryna Sabalenka made 24 winning holes to beat Britain’s Katie Boulter 6-3, 6-3.

Second-seeded Belarus advanced to the quarterfinals against American Amanda Anisimova.

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