Sonay Kartal has more than proved that she belongs inside the top 100 of the WTA Tour rankings with her performances across 2025.
Kartal’s impressive run to the Wimbledon fourth round helped the British star crack the top 50 of the rankings for the first time.
She has since slipped to world number 70, but she still enjoyed some impressive victories in the latter part of the year.
Kartal’s victory over Mirra Andreeva at the China Open was her biggest to date, and helped her reach her first WTA 1000 quarter-final.
The star is currently the British No. 2, behind Emma Raducanu, and she’s shared how she felt when she saw Raducanu win the US Open in 2021.
Sonay Kartal found Emma Raducanu’s victory ‘super inspiring’
Kartal and Raducanu spent much of their time as juniors playing against each other, and just a year splits them in age.
Kartal was watching along with the rest of the world as Raducanu became the first qualifier in the Open Era to win a singles major title at the US Open.
Speaking to The Telegraph, Kartal revealed her true feelings when she watched her contemporary’s greatest moment.
She explained: “Obviously we watched it and it was an incredible couple of weeks for her. It gave us all a bit of extra firepower and just the proof that anything is possible.
“It was super inspiring to watch someone that you’ve grown up with, that you were playing under-9 nationals with, lift the US Open trophy.”
Kartal and Raducanu have yet to play each other on the WTA Tour, although the longer Kartal stays in the top 1000 the more likely it will become.
Watch Sonay Kartal practice with Emma Raducanu as a 10-year-old
Kartal and Raducanu’s relationship runs all the way back to a time when they could barely hold full-size racquets.
The two stars were captured training together when Kartal was 10 and Raducanu was just 9 with a video that shows them battling it out on the court.
Kartal won the point, but she was shortly outstripped by Raducanu, who would enter her name in tennis folklore.
While Raducanu has not lived up to the promise of becoming a Grand Slam winner again, she and Kartal have proved they have what it takes to cut it with the elite.
