Emma Raducanu played a sensational match on the grass at the 2024 Wimbledon Championships, besting former Top 15 player on the WTA Tour, Elise Mertens, in two sets.
Raducanu has played some really solid grass tennis so far this year, but she struggled in her first-round match at SW19. It was a tight win against Renata Zarazua, who is not known as a great grass tennis player and was a lucky loser, but things looked much better in her second match.
She faced former Top 15 player Elise Mertens, who is solid on grass and she outplayed the Belgian similarly to how she bested people during her US Open run. It was an amazing display from the Brit, which delighted the crowd, who were thoughtfully watching one of the biggest hopes of British tennis this evening under a closed roof on Court 1.
The first set lasted only 38 minutes, and Raducanu won it 6-1. Still, there was quite a bit of battling in the opening set, even though the former US Open champion arguably dominated easily.
She didn't blow Mertens off the court but applied a lot of pressure on her while remaining quite stable in the rallies. This resulted in 14 unforced errors from the Belgian in seven games of play.
That's a lot of unforced errors, and a lot of that was because of Raduacnu's actions. The Brit also took an early break in the second set, which was ideal because she didn't allow Mertens to break her momentum.
Raducanu bested her opponent also in the second set, as she was already up to 10 winners in the set by the time the score showed 3-1. The final score was 6-1, 6-2 for Raducanu, who finished the match with 22 winners.
Emma Raducanu vs Elise Mertens Match Stats:
| Emma Raducanu | 6-1, 6-2 | Elise Mertens |
| 3 | Aces | 1 |
| 1 | Double Faults | 1 |
| 75% | First Serve % | 58% |
| 76% (29/38) | Points Won After First Serve % | 54% (15/28) |
| 62% (8/13) | Points Won After Second Serve % | 50% (10/20) |
| 29% (4/14) | Break Point Conversion | 0% (0/2) |
| 22 | Winners | 14 |
| 14 | Unforced Errors | 21 |
0 Comments