The final quarterfinal match on Friday night in the 2025 Cincinnati Open featured 2 of the top players in the WTA. world #2 and 2023 Cincinnati Open champion American Coco Gauff faced world #5 Jasmine Paolini of Italy.
Paolini road to the quarterfinal after her 1st round bye. saw her defeat former top 5 ranked Maria Sakkari of Greece in the 2nd round, the #26 seed American Ashlyn Krueger in the 3rd round, and former Roland Garros and Wimbledon champion Barbora Krejcikova in the round of 16.
For Gauff, she also had a 1st round bye before she beat China's Xinyu Wang in the 2nd round, a walkover win after Ukraine's Dayana Yastremska withdrew due to illness in the 3rd round, and a win over Italian Lucia Bronzetti.
The first set saw Gauff jump out to a quick 3-0 lead before Paolini could respond. Paolini struggled to get much going in the first set, and it looked like it was going to be a short night for the Italian as Gauff would break Paolini again and take the opening set.
The second set saw more fight out of Paolini. Gauff started to slow down a little and Paolini took advantage winning the second set.
Paolini would start the third set with an early break to go up 3-1, before Gauff would get the break back. Then Gauff would hold serve to tie it up at 3-3. Back on serve, Paolini would hold, then break Coco to go up 5-3 and serve for the match. Facing triple match point, Gauff would battle back to bring the score to 40-30 Paolini. The Italian would take the next point and punch her ticket to the semi final.
Jasmine Paolini defeats Coco Gauff 2-6,6-4,6-3.
Paolini will play Polina Kudermetova of Russia in the semifinal on Sunday.
After the match Jasmine Paolini spoke with the media.