Madison Keys has seen her Australian Open title defence cut short, thwarted by Jessica Pegula in the fourth round.
It marked a hugely impressive performance from the latter, who swept aside her friend with minimal fuss.
And, speaking after, Madison Keys was full of praise for the 31-year-old, who has just reached a ninth career Grand Slam quarter-final.
She even pointed out what she viewed as Jessica Pegula’s ‘superpower’, which she argued is not talked about enough.
Madison Keys praises Jessica Pegula after losing to her at the Australian Open
Despite the nature of her defeat, Keys cut an upbeat figure in her press conference.
That was, despite the forfeit Keys agreed to do after losing to Pegula.
Speaking about her friend, who has now levelled their head-to-head record, Keys admitted: “I think Jess does a really good job at, like you said, taking time away. She redirects incredibly well, so it’s kind of a catch-22 sometimes with her, because it’s almost like the more pace you give her, the quicker the ball is coming back at you.
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“I think another thing that I don’t think she always gets as much credit for is she hits a lot of very deep balls, so you can’t really do a whole lot with them, or if you do, you kind of have to take a little bit more of a risk just because she does a really good job of kind of pushing people off of the baseline as she’s slowly taking her baseline.
“So you don’t really want to just keep firing back at her, because the ball just is going to start coming quicker and quicker.
“But in that same token, she also hits very flat and low, so especially on a court like here where the ball is not bouncing super high and the ball is going through the court pretty quickly, it’s not super easy to kind of try to lift the ball or slow the ball down, just because it’s not exactly the easiest ball to try to hit.
| Event | Year | Round | Winner |
| Australian Open | 2026 | Round of 16 | Jessica Pegula |
| Adelaide | 2025 | Final | Madison Keys |
| US Open | 2023 | Round of 16 | Madison Keys |
| San Diego | 2022 | Quarter-finals | Jessica Pegula |
“So I think that’s always been, I think, in my opinion, her superpower.”
Pegula will now face Amanda Anisimova in the quarter-finals, in yet another tantalising all-American affair.
Madison Keys’ Australian Open title defence comes to an end
It had been an impressive run thus far from Keys, but her Australian Open title run has officially come to an end.
However, the footage of her laughing and joking with Pegula after the match as they both sought to cool down suggests that she is not taking the defeat too harshly.
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She earned three solid victories to kickstart her campaign in Melbourne, but came unstuck against her good friend, who won in straight sets.
Sadly, Keys is now likely to suffer a hefty rankings drop, having lost in the fourth round.
