Girls vs. Women
Today, we have a very special matchup coming up in the women's doubles competition as American teen sensations Cori "Coco" Gauff and Catherine "Caty" McNally are facing German Laura Siegemund and Katarina Srebotnik from Slovenia. The age difference between the four is sufficient to call this one a battle of the generations.
Putting together Gauff's (15) and McNally's (17) ages, they only end up one year older than Siegemund (31). The fact that Srebotnik (38) already won 28 titles on the ITF tour before they were born is even more intriguing. Age is just a number and doesn't have much to do with their abilities on court, but it definitely makes for a good story here (and in many more matches to come with these two American young guns).
Terrifying Teens
The two teens already won a WTA International event together in Washington this year. The scoreline in their four matches: 6-3 6-2, 6-0 6-3, 6-1 6-2, 6-2 6-2. The next event they played together were the US Open where they captivated the New York crowd. Top-tier doubles players like Julia Goerges and Katerina Siniakova or Nicole Melichar and Kveta Peschke fell victim to "McCoco" how they call themselves. Eventually, they lost to runner-ups Victoria Azarenka and Ashleigh Barty. Although they didn't stand a chance in this one, it was more the result of a week full of attention which they haven't been used to before in their lives.
After a month of getting rest (and also not defying the WTA age rules), they are teaming up again in Linz. In their first round match, "McCoco" beat Kaitlyn Christian and Alexa Guarachi 6-2 6-3.
Siegemund sick, Srebotnik struggling
Siegemund/ Srebotnik didn't have too much trouble getting into the quarterfinals either, beating Fiona Ferro and Jil Teichmann 6-2 6-1. It was Katarina Srebotnik's first win after 8 consecutive losses and a streak of 2-13 over her last 15 matches. Even after that win, she might still lack self-confidence after all these losses. Her partner Laura Siegemund is currently in a third set battle in her singles match against Ekaterina Alexandrova. She made it all the way through qualifying even though she had the flu which has not fully faded away yet.
After all the matches she's played and stating that she still feels ill, I'm keen to fade her and her struggling partner against an electrifying, motivated young doubles team. The Americans' strong serve paired with McNally's ability at the net and Gauff's aggressive game from the baseline should get them through their service games pretty handily. Apart from that, they should also generate a lot of break chances, especially on Siegemund's serve.
Even at their age, I already consider "McCoco" a world-class doubles pairing. They are facing two players that never played together before. The youngsters should be the favorites in this matchup and with them being in much better shape right now, I'll take them to win the match at 1.90 odds.
