American third seed Jessica Pegula’s said her first-round Wimbledon exit was her “worst result of the year” as she became the highest seed to fall at the tournament so far.
Pegula was below par in a 6-2 6-3 defeat by Italy’s Elisabetta Cocciaretto, ranked 113 places below her at 116 in the world.
The 31-year-old had heavy strapping on her right knee but said that did not bother her as she was dismantled in just 58 minutes on court two.
“This is definitely probably the worst result I’ve had all year,” she said.
“I’ve been winning lots of matches. It’s just all about it having to come together for two weeks. Sometimes it doesn’t quite all align when you need it to.”
Pegula, fresh from beating Iga Swiatek to win the title at Bad Homburg in Germany last week, was predicted to go far at Wimbledon.
But while she has long lingered around the world’s top 10, consistent progress at Grand Slam level continues to elude her.
She has only once gone beyond the quarter-final stage of a major – at last year’s US Open where she lost to Aryna Sabalenka in the final.
Since then, Pegula has gone out before the last eight in all three Grand Slam tournaments.
But this marks her worst performance at a major since the 2020 French Open.
“I haven’t lost first round of a Slam in a very long time, so that sucks,” she said.
“I used to kind of have trouble getting past the first round for a while. I remember I had a really tough match and I just told myself, I’m done losing first round, I’m not losing first round.
“It’s disappointing. I don’t know how else to put it. I’m upset that I wasn’t able to turn anything around.”
Cocciaretto had faced Pegula at SW19 before, a 6-4 6-0 defeat at the 2023 tournament.
But an error-strewn performance from the world number three allowed Cocciaretto, 24, to take advantage and secure her second career win over a top-10 player.
Things unravelled quickly as Pegula was broken in the third game of the opening set on another hot day at the Championships.
The double break swiftly followed and Cocciaretto wrapped up the opening set in just 25 minutes.
The second followed a similar pattern with Pegula losing her serve in the seventh game and letting out a cry of frustration before bending over her racquet in exasperation as she prepared to serve to stay in the match.
But she was unable to do so as a double fault and two long forehands gave Cocciaretto three match points – and she took the first.
Pegula made 24 unforced errors and struggled on serve. She hit five winners and was unable to conjure a single break point throughout the match.