British tennis player Emma Raducanu largely burst onto the senior women's scene back in 2021 with a very unexpected performance at Wimbledon and then US Open win.
Her Wimbledon debut as a wildcard caught the attention of the press, as she became the youngest British woman to make it to the third round since Elena Baltacha back in 2002. Having defeated Sorana Cirstea at the third round stage, she became the youngest British woman to reach the last 16 in the Open Era - at this time she also entered the top 200. Although she was forced to retire in the second set of her fourth round Wimbledon tie, despite a poor performance at the Silicon Valley Classic, she reached the final of the WTA 125 event in Chicago, and although she lost that game to Clara Tauson, the ranking points gained lifted her to a career high of No 150.
At the US Open stage, she entered as a qualifier (and not wildcard) and and was given odds of 400/1 to win, yet she reached the semi finals without dropping a set - becoming only the fifth player in the Open Era to reach a Grand Slam semi final as a qualifier, and also, only the fifth player to make this semi final on their debut (from a British perspective she was also the first to reach this stage since Virginia Wade back in 1968).
With her place in the final booked, she entered the top 25 and became British No 1. She continued her tournament record of not dropping a set (another first since Serena Williams in 2014) and defeated Leylah Fernandez 2-0, winning with a 109 mph ace and in the build up she had gone to 4/6 favourites - which shows just how far she had come.
In lifting the title, she became the first player ever (male or female) to win a Grand Slam tournament in the Open Era as a qualifier and is rising to No 23 in the rankings, it represented a change of 332 places since the start of the year. Tennis odds along with this bet365 bonus in her favour would have massively spiked at this stage given the upward trajectory she appeared to be on, but sadly she then hit a bit of a mixed spell in following tournaments. Although she rose to No 19 in the rankings as we ended the 2021 Tour, she significantly struggled with a variety of injuries that seriously hampered her court time and when she did return, the success did not with a number of early round exits.
We now find ourselves in August 2023, and the 20 year old potential star is finally looking to get fully back on track and put all those injury issues behind her, and having undergone surgery on her wrist and ankle back in May, on Wednesday she finally returned to the practice court for the first time.
Having missed the French Open and Wimbledon, it is very unlikely she will be fully fit and in condition for the US Open at the end of the month, but she will now be determined to make her comeback properly before the end of the year - and then maybe who knows, a return to her former potential come 2024.
If she can demonstrate that the injuries are in the past, her odds on coming tournaments will undoubtedly return to their former levels given the clear and natural talent she holds.
0 Comments