Emma Raducanu reveals what ‘success’ would be for her in 2024
Emma Raducanu has admitted that she is ‘far from the finished product’, as the Brit reveals her main goals for the season.
Raducanu spent eight months on the injury sidelines last year, having undergone surgery to both wrists and her left ankle.
The 21-year-old made her long awaited return at the WTA 250 event in Auckland last month, beating Elena Gabriela Ruse in the first round before losing a three set battle to eventual runner-up Elina Svitolina.
She then went onto make her Grand Slam comeback at the Australian Open, with a similar fate of winning her opening round and then going onto lose a tight three set second round match.
And Raducanu has spoken about how she is still trying to get back to match fitness, “I’m still finding my feet on the matchcourt, I’m not fully there but that will come with time.
“I’m just trying to improve my game because I’m not the finished product, far from it. I feel like now is the time to start because I’ve had some illness and injuries over the couple of years since [winning the US Open in 2021], so I’m looking forward to working on my game, improving my level and the results will take care of themselves.”
Even before undergoing surgery, Raducanu had struggled with a variety of different injury woes that prevented her from progressing as hoped for after the historic run to the US Open title.
The former No.10 has explained her frustration from the past two years, “I’ve never really had the chance to do proper training weeks back-to-back. For six or seven months, before I ended up having the surgeries, I was only practising one or two hours a day just to limit the load on the wrists.”
Raducanu continued, “In a way, it’s frustrating that the last couple of years haven’t been how I’ve wanted but I think we take a lesson from everything and now is the time to start that work, and I’m really enjoying it.”
The now ranked No.296 is continuing her comeback in Abu Dhabi later today and has revealed her goals for the season, “For me, success would be seeing my level improving in practice first and then in matches.
“I know that when my level will be there, putting it into a match will take some time to apply. But I know that seeing the level increase, that results will follow. Also, I would love to win a title of any grade.”
Emma Raducanu will play world No.36 Marie Bouzkova at the WTA 500 event in the Middle East this afternoon, in a first-time meeting between the pair.
Emma’s first #MubadalaAbuDhabiOpen match takes place tomorrow, Monday 5th ????
Are you coming down for round one?#Mubadala #AbuDhabiSC #InAbuDhabi #WTA pic.twitter.com/1b5jsuyq5V
— Mubadala Abu Dhabi Open (@MubadalaADOpen) February 4, 2024
Inside the baseline…
It has clearly been an extremely challenging time for Emma Raducanu since winning the 2021 US Open, both physically and mentally. Raducanu has been very open about the fact that she would be happy to drop down to the Challenger scene, which could be a good idea to get as much match practice in as possible. That being said, the former British No.1 has not looked too far off the pace in her comeback so far, but will need to be on form to compete with a tricky player in Marie Bouzkova.
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