Emma Raducanu isn't known as a very experienced clay player, but she hasn't been surprised by the excellent play she's produced this week.
This time last week, Raducanu was in France playing at the Billie Jan King Cup, and she hoped to do well. She did more than well, winning two crucial matches that ensured her country a place at the Billie Jean King Cup Finals.
Those wins certainly contributed to her feeling very confident about her tennis right now. Her good play continued into the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix, where she bested Angelique Kerber and then added a good win over Linda Noskova.
That win over Noskova actually featured a bagel (winning a set 6-0), and she was asked about it after the match, admitting that she wasn't surprised by it.
"No, I wasn't, to be honest, not because, you know, I was expecting to play that well and win a 6-0 set, like, Linda is a really tough opponent. I was just not thinking about the score at all."
"I think sometimes I have the ability to lose track of the score like I did last week when I thought the match was over, embarrassingly."
She lost track of the score during one of her recent matches, which was quite funny, but that speaks to her focus on the actual play. So a bagel, in that sense, does make sense, and it's a deliberate approach by Raducanu. She's just focusing on play, and it's worked out well for her so far.
"But I think that the best way that I'm kind of dealing with everything is that she's just zoning in on the games and just trying to be as stingy as possible with everything."
"Yeah, I'm not thinking about the score too much, because I think when you start thinking ahead about the score or whatever, then you start getting in your own head."