Out of nowhere, Emma Raducanu’s voice began to quiver and her eyes suddenly filled with tears. None of us in the room saw it coming, least of all it seemed Raducanu.
That was, in many ways, the most revealing part. Raducanu had given all the usual answers to all the usual questions after her first-round defeat to Solana Sierra: she was disappointed to lose, she needed to take the positives from the fight she mustered in the second set after being ‘bageled’ in the first, and how her lack of matches leading in to Roland Garros due to injury and illness had held her back.
And then came the question that abruptly moved her to tears. As someone still young in their career, and who has already suffered their fair share of injuries and health issues, what kind of mindset do you need to stop and come back all the time.
‘It’s very difficult,’ she replied. ‘I think you need a lot of resilience. I think I’m trying my best each day.’ It was then she started to waver. ‘I think that’s all I can ask of myself.’
In that simple reply, you saw the toll the last few years have taken on this young sportswoman. This season already, she has struggled with a foot injury and a post-viral illness that left her able to play just one match since March before this.
Her emotion was less about the defeat – that was to be expected, really, for someone so short of competitive practice, and against a clay-court specialist in 30+ degree Parisian heat – but what it takes to keep fighting in the spotlight.
Her emotion was less about the defeat – that was to be expected, really, for someone so short of competitive practice – but what it takes to keep fighting in the spotlight
Raducanu recently rehired Andrew Richardson, the coach with whom she won the US Open in 2021 but who was then sacked just days later
For all the criticism Raducanu faces, and she has more trolls than most, it is easy to forget this is someone who is still only 23 and has already had multiple wrist and back surgeries that left her using a mobility scooter.
And, for all the modelling contracts and sponsorship deals, this is still someone who won the most unexpected Grand Slam in history as an 18-year-old and would never be able to play tennis for the love of the game again. Every other match of that teenager’s career, as it has proved, she would play under the most unscrupulous microscope.
Raducanu gave another sense of that ahead of the tournament when asked about her decision to rehire Andrew Richardson, the coach with whom she won the US Open in 2021 but who was then sacked just days later, a decision long understood to have been driven by her father.
‘I think at that time it was very difficult to say I made a mistake, because in my life everything changed upside down, and I didn’t really think I had the most handle over the situation in the sense that I was being pulled left, right. I didn’t really know what was going on.’
She’s been through eight permanent coaches since, each with a different view of the direction of her career. It was her decision to reach out to Richardson, someone she trusts completely, via text and hardly told anyone until it was done. ‘I really wanted to just make the decisions for myself and most authentically,’ she said.
It does, at last, feel as though she is the one taking control.
She could have skipped the clay court season entirely to focus on preparing for Wimbledon but felt, regardless of surface, she needed matches. After two-and-half months away from the tour, you can see why she felt it would help and the spirit she showed in the second set should give he heart moving on to the grass.
After her defeat, eyes naturally turn to Wimbledon and a decisive summer for Raducanu. She will need even more of that resilience she talks about. She was unseeded at Roland Garros and now faces a highly unlikely race against time if she is to earn one at the All England Club.
After her defeat, eyes naturally turn to Wimbledon and a decisive summer for Raducanu and she will need even more of that resilience she talks about
Raducanu remains 39 in the world but could drop further depending on other results at the French Open. She has only been seeded once at Wimbledon in 2022, which ended in her worst performance there in a second-round exit. Being a low-ranking seed can often end with a bigger name in the third round than simply being left at the mercy of the draw.
Her game is far more suited to grass where she can take advantage of the skiddy surface and not need to muster as much power to hit winners as on clay. She hit none in the first set against Sierra.
She will play at Queen’s in a fortnight, where she reached the quarter-final last year and has ranking points to defend, and would need to go even deeper there if she is to stand a chance. Raducanu has also entered the Berlin Open and Eastbourne, but may not play both, before she rocks up at SW19 at the end of June.
‘I’m looking forward to getting back on home soil,’ said Raducanu. And, it seems, in taking back control and seeing where her own mind – and Richardson’s – can take her.
