(London) “Sometimes I think I wish I hadn’t won the US Open. Twenty-one months after her incredible victory in the American Grand Slam lift, Briton Emma Raducanu is still struggling to regain the level of her summer of 2021.
She was only eighteen when she won at Flushing Meadows after an unlikely run, coming out of three qualifying rounds to enter the main draw, sweeping all her opponents by not conceding a single set. in ten games.
Raducanu had never won a single tournament on the main circuit. Her prize list has since remained stuck in this sole title, prestigious, but placing on her disproportionate expectations that her body and her mind have paid for.
Fallout to 128e world rank, with a round of 16 loss in March at Indian Wells as the best result this season, she has accumulated injuries, changed coaches several times. Recently operated on an ankle and a wrist, she could not line up at Roland-Garros and will not be able to play the Wimbledon tournament next month (July 3 to 16).
“Since then, I have suffered many setbacks, one after another. I’m resilient, I tolerate a lot of things, but it’s not easy,” she said in an interview with The Daily. The Times.
“And sometimes I think I wish I hadn’t won the US Open,” she adds. “Then I say to myself “Remember this feeling (that of his coronation in the final of the United States Open on September 10, 2021, editor’s note), this promise”. »
With her unprecedented victory – never before in the Open era has a player emerging from qualifications won a Grand Slam tournament – Emma Raducanu has become one of the most sought-after sportswomen by sponsors.
The Briton born in Canada to a Romanian father and a Chinese mother is under contract with Nike, Porsche, Vodafone and Dior.
But she says she had to grow up very quickly on the circuit to not just serve as a “piggy bank”.
PHOTO RAED KRISHAN, ASSOCIATED PRESS ARCHIVES
Emma Raducanu
The circuit is absolutely brutal. What I’ve come to understand over the past two years is that the circuit and everything that comes with it is not a very friendly, safe environment.
Emma Raducanu
“You have to be on your guard because there are a lot of sharks. I think people in the industry, especially because I was 19, now 20, see me as a piggy bank. It was difficult to navigate these waters. I burned myself several times, I learned, learned to keep a circle around me as restricted as possible. »