Emma Raducanu is feeling “reborn” and freed of the weight of her US Open triumph as she prepares to make her comeback in Auckland.
The 21-year-old will face a qualifier in the opening round of the ASB Classic, her first match since April following operations on both her wrists and one ankle.
Raducanu looked relaxed and happy as she spoke to the media in New Zealand, saying: “I feel reborn in a way, I feel fresh, I feel ready, I feel happy, I feel excited.
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“Overall I’m feeling very positive and lighter. I think for two years after the US Open I felt maybe a bit more weight on my shoulders but now I feel completely fresh.”
The former British number one had hoped to make her comeback last autumn but her recovery was not a smooth process and she was forced to delay until the start of the new season.
She has been building back up to full fitness on and off court at the National Tennis Centre in Roehampton under the guidance of Lawn Tennis Association staff.
For her final week working in London she turned to childhood coach Nick Cavaday while accompanying her in Auckland is mentor Jane O’Donoghue, a former coach who left the LTA to pursue a career in finance.
Raducanu has not had a permanent coach since splitting from Sebastian Sachs at the beginning of June.
O’Donoghue also helped out Raducanu at Wimbledon in 2022 when she was between coaches, and the former US Open champion said: “It’s really nice and refreshing to have her around, I know she has my best interests at heart and it’s just nice to have a familiar face.”
While it is likely to take time for Raducanu to find her feet on the match court again, she believes she is returning to the tour a better player and hungry to succeed.
“It’s going to be fun, I think, going out there competing again, having the competitive juices flowing,” she said.
“I’ve been training really well in practice so overall I’m feeling really good about my game. I think tennis wise I’m better than I was a year ago today, it’s just playing a match it’s going to be different.
“I got to spend a lot of time just thinking how I feel and I definitely got that hunger back just to be on the court competing, training, sweating. I think you really appreciate the time you have when you’re healthy and on court.”
While Raducanu received a wild card in Auckland, she is still waiting to see whether the same will apply for the Australian Open.
Her protected ranking given to players who have been sidelined long term is 103, which appears unlikely to be high enough to secure direct entry in Melbourne.
Currently that would mean going through qualifying at a grand slam for the first time since her remarkable New York triumph in 2021, and she said: “Qualifying doesn’t faze me.
“Right now I’m approaching it like I am in qualifying because I am. I’ve done pretty well in qualifying before so I’ll just see how it goes.”
Preparing to make his 2024 debut across the Tasman Sea at the Brisbane International is Andy Murray, who will take on second seed Grigor Dimitrov in his opening match.
Most of the focus at the tournament is on the returning Rafael Nadal and Naomi Osaka, and Murray faced the Spaniard in a practice session on Saturday.
Nadal has been sidelined for a year by a hip problem, and Murray said: “It’s great to have him back playing. He’s obviously working extremely hard, like always. He looked physically good, was playing well.”
Both men would need to make it to the semi-finals to meet in anger, and Murray cited renewing his long-time rivalries with Nadal and Novak Djokovic as a goal.
“If I get the opportunity to practise with them, I still really, really enjoy that,” said the Scot. “It does bring back some good memories. But ideally I’d want to be doing that in the tournaments, not in the first rounds. I’d like to be doing it
in the latter stages, if I can.”
Swiatek passes Kerber test to reach Italian Open quarter-finals
Two-time Italian Open champion Iga Swiatek advanced to the quarter-finals of this year's tournament with an impressive 7-5 6-3 win over Angelique Kerber on Monday.
Three-time grand slam winner Kerber provided Swiatek with a real step up after routine victories over Bernarda Pera and Yulia Putintseva in the first two rounds on the clay in Rome.
Kerber responded to Swiatek's first break – which came in the eighth game – with one of her own, but the world number one then recaptured her composure to force a series of break points in Kerber's next two service games, finally converting at the eighth attempt to take the opener.
Kerber refused to go away, breaking straight back in the first game of the second set, but Swiatek upped her game to take the contest away from the 36-year-old.
Swiatek dropped just three further points on her own serve from there, adding three breaks of her own to set up a last-eight meeting with Madison Keys for Tuesday.
Data Debrief: Swiatek unmatched on clay
While Kerber rolled back the years to trouble Swiatek early on, she lacked the staying power to live with the world number one in longer rallies on a surface where she is truly unmatched.
Her win ratio at clay-court events at WTA 1000-level now stands at 88.2 per cent (30 wins, four defeats), the best of any player to have played a minimum of five matches since the format's 2009 introduction, ahead of Serena Williams at 88 per cent.
Osaka sees encouraging Italian Open run halted by Zheng in last 16
Naomi Osaka's promising Italian Open run was halted by Zheng Qinwen on Monday, as the seventh seed denied the four-time grand slam champion a quarter-final place.
Following Saturday's triumph over Daria Kasatkina – her second successive straight-sets win over a top-20 opponent in Rome – Osaka laughed off the "Clayomi" moniker given to her by some fans.
On Monday, her old troubles on the surface came back to the fore as Zheng dominated from the off to make the tournament's last eight for a second straight year, winning 6-2 6-4.
Osaka saw her serve broken in the very first game only to hit straight back, but Zheng assumed control by taking seven straight games to go from 2-1 down in the opener to 2-0 up in the second set.
The 21-year-old produced a clinical performance and converted all four of her break points, winning 78 per cent of first-serve points to Osaka's 68 per cent as she teed up a quarter-final clash with either Coco Gauff or Paula Badosa.
Data Debrief: 'Clayomi' no more as Zheng triumphs
Osaka impressed on a surface long regarded as her worst in Italy, but it was a bridge too far for her on Monday, Zheng reaching her fourth WTA 1000 quarter-final.
Since the format's introduction in 2009, she is just the second Asian player to reach multiple quarter-finals on both hardcourts and clay at that level before the age of 23, the other being Osaka.
Djokovic bemoans 'completely off' performance after early Italian Open exit
Novak Djokovic lamented his dismal showing as Alejandro Tabilo profited from the world number one's "completely off" performance to triumph at the Italian Open.
Tabilo stunned Djokovic with a straight-sets victory in the third round on Sunday, winning 6-2, 6-3 in his maiden ATP Tour clash with the Serbian.
The Chilean advances to the fourth round at a Masters 1000 event for just the second time after Indian Wells in 2023, with Djokovic unable to explain his struggles in Rome.
"I just wasn't able to find any kind of good feelings on the court, to be honest, striking the ball. I was completely off," he said.
A six-time champion in Rome, the 36-year-old won his opening-round match at the ATP Masters 1000 event against Corentin Moutet.
However, Djokovic was inadvertently hit on the head by a falling water bottle when leaving the court after that victory.
Whether that incident impacted his performance against Tabilo remains to be seen.
"I don't know, to be honest. I have to check that," he said. "Training was different. I was going for [a] kind of easy training yesterday.
"I didn't feel anything, but I also didn't feel the same. Today under high stress, it was quite bad – not in terms of pain, but in terms of this balance.
"Just no coordination. Completely different player from what it was two nights ago. Could be. I don't know. I have to do medical checkups and see what's going on."
Tabilo's next opponent will be Karen Khachanov, who saw off Francisco Cerundolo 6-2, 6-4, while Djokovic is made to wait for his 1100th match win.
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