Reigning US Open champion Coco Gauff will lead the American tennis team at the Paris Olympics, which will be played at Roland Garros, the home of the French Open.
Gauff, 20, the world number 2, was due to represent Team USA in Tokyo in 2021 but tested positive for Covid-19 shortly before the Games and withdrew from competition.
This time, Gauff will be one of the favourites, playing on the same clay courts where she reached the French Open finals in 2022 and was a semi-finalist this year. She also won the French Open doubles title this year with Katerina Siniakova of Czechoslovakia.
Gauff will be joined by the fifth-ranked Jessica Pegula, world number 11 Danielle Collins and number 17 Emma Navarro in the singles draw at the Paris Games.
The men’s team will include the world number 12 Taylor Fritz and number 13 Tommy Paul — the highest-ranked Americans — as well as number 44 Chris Eubanks and number 53 Marcos Giron.
Paul and Giron competed at the Tokyo Games, where the Americans failed to win a tennis medal for the first time since the sport became part of the Olympics again in 1988.
Team USA will be able to enter two teams in both the men’s and women’s doubles draw, along with one mixed doubles team that is yet to be chosen.
Likely doubles partners
Gauff and Pegula, who lost the French Open doubles final in 2022, are expected to team up.
Pegula returned to action last week, recovering from a neck injury in April that forced her to miss the French Open. She was a singles quarterfinalist there in 2022.
Collins, the 2022 Australian Open runner-up, said this would be her final season on the tour, She won two titles this year in Miami and Charleston. She reached the French Open quarter-finals in 2020 but lost in the second-round this year.
Doubles player Desirae Krawczyk will team up Collins at the Paris Games. Collins and Krawczyk, both 30, won a doubles title last year in Charleston. Krawczyk is a four-time Grand Slam champion in mixed doubles.
Team USA is also taking Rajeev Ram, 40, to his third Olympics. He will be paired with Austin Krajicek in Paris while Fritz will team up with Paul.
Sources: USA Today, ESPN