Emma Raducanu’s future in tennis is the subject of heated debate in the UK media following her US Open exit.
Raducanu’s wait for a first US Open win since her memorable triumph in 2021 goes on after a first-round loss to Sofia Kenin.
It was a tough draw for the Briton in a battle of former Grand Slam champions and it could have gone either way. But a loose service game from Raducanu midway through the first set ultimately proved costly.
A tearful Raducanu was feeling “sad” as her wait for a first win at the US Open since her memorable 2021 triumph goes on.
The 21-year-old stunned the world three years ago when she won the title in her third senior tournament, but she has struggled to live up to her billing since then.
After a first-round exit in 2022 and missing last year through injury, Sofia Kenin handed out more misery with a 6-1 3-6 6-4 win on the Grandstand court.
Asked how the defeat made her feel, she paused before fighting back the tears to say: “Yeah, I feel down, like I feel sad. This is a tournament I really want to do well in.
I’m just going to go back to the drawing board and train and analyse where I went wrong and try and improve for the rest of the season.
“Obviously, the slams are over for this year, but it’s not actually that long until Australia comes around again.”
Having played just one tournament since Wimbledon and skipping the Olympics to focus on the US Open, questions remain over the direction of her career after she admitted that she might have got her preparation wrong.
I would have preferred to probably play a little bit more before coming into the US Open,” added Raducanu.
“I know when I have a lot of matches, just like every player, you feel really good, you feel like everything’s automatic.
“I can learn from it. And, you know, manage my schedule slightly differently.
“It wasn’t just me. It was more of like a collective call and that’s what happened, and I can’t really change it.”
Now there are reports in the UK media suggesting some of Raducanu’s sponsorship deals are due to be renewed imminently, with her commercial value in a very different place than it was when emerged from the 2021 US Open as a global sporting icon.
Raducanu lapped up lucrative deals with British Airways, Vodafone, Tiffany, Dior, Porsche, Evian, Wilson, Nike and HSBC after her US Open win, but
The Telegraph are reporting some of those may now be under threat due to her lack of success on the tennis court.
Will A-list sponsors want to re-sign a tennis player who doesn’t have a ranking that gets her into the game’s top tournaments?
That is a question that may soon be under discussion, with seven-time Grand Slam singles champion John McEnroe ‘confused’ by Raducanu’s form since her New York miracle.
“Sometimes I see her and it looks like she is heading back towards the top of the game and then other times I’m a bit befuddled about what’s going on,” McEnroe told Tennis365 at a Eurosport event.
“I’m not close to her team and what is going on, but I hope she is healthy.
“There were a couple of matches at Wimbledon and she looked really good and then in the last one, she looked really shaky.
“It’s hard to know what to say about her. I don’t really know.
“She is certainly in a better space and healthier than she was a year ago, so that’s good, but I don’t know where she is mentally.
Does she have that absolute belief and commitment to win something big again or be in the top ten? That I can’t say.
