Wimbledon 2025: 4 of the top 5 women's seeds eliminated early as Coco Gauff, Jessica Pegula fall in first round

We're only three days in on the 2025 Wimbledon tournament, and chaos has already reigned. For the top-ranked players on the women's side, this year's Wimbledon has been particularly brutal, as four of the top five seeds fell in the early days of the competition.

The No. 3-seeded player, Jessica Pegula, fell first on Tuesday, with a shocking first-round loss to Elisabetta Cocciaretto in straight sets. Then No. 5 Zheng Qinwen, the 2024 Olympic gold medalist, fell against Katerina Siniakova later on Tuesday, followed by world No. 2 Coco Gauff's stunning loss to Dayana Yastremska in straight sets.

On Wednesday, No. 4-seeded Jasmine Paolini became the latest to fall, as the Italian was upset by Kamilla Rakhimova in the second round.

The only top-five seed remaining is Aryna Sabalenka, the world No. 1, who returned to Wimbledon after missing last year's tournament due to a shoulder injury. The 27-year-old Belarusian cruised to another win in straight sets on Wednesday over Marie Bouzkova to advance to the third round.

Though Wimbledon has not been her strongest in the past — Sabalenka has made the semifinals twice in her career, but has not advanced to the final — a wide-open field leaves plenty of room for Sabalenka to take her first Wimbledon title.

Gauff's loss, while a stark contrast to her French Open win last month, was not entirely unexpected: Grass is easily Gauff's weakest surface, and the American has never advanced past the fourth round of Wimbledon. Similarly, Zheng exits Wimbledon in the first round for the third straight year; Pegula, who advanced to the quarterfinals once, also tends to fare better on hard surfaces.

Paolini is a bit of an anomaly: The 29-year-old made the Wimbledon finals last year in a similarly wide-open tournament, before losing to Barbora Krejčíková. But prior to that, Paolini had never made it past the second round. (The 2024 Wimbledon tournament was a particularly odd one as well: Other than Paolini, only two other players in the top 15 seeds made it past round four; the champion, Krejčíková, was the 31st seed.)

Regardless, it caps off a strange start to the 2025 contest, as 23 seeded players fell in the first two days — a record-tying number. 13 of those players were men, including No. 3-seeded Alexander Zverev. The chaos has continued on day 3, with No. 12 Frances Tiafoe losing to Cameron Norrie.

The second round is now halfway over, with several key games taking place on Thursday. After an upset-heavy start to the tournament, it's likely that Wimbledon will keep coming with the upsets as the contest continues.