Emma Raducanu suffered a chastening 6-1, 6-0 defeat by Iga Swiatek in the Australian Open third round on Saturday, January 18, but the Briton said she was grateful to be fully fit and playing at a high level again after overcoming a succession of injuries.
Raducanu has not been able to kick on from her US Open win in 2021 due to her fitness issues, and the 22-year-old missed five events during the WTA Asian swing last year after spraining ligaments in her foot.
Coming into the new season, she missed a tune-up tournament in Auckland with a back issue but hit the ground running at Melbourne Park, beating 26th seed Ekaterina Alexandrova and former French Open semifinalist Amanda Anisimova.
Five-time Grand Slam champion Swiatek proved an altogether different challenge, however, and while Raducanu won only one game against the world No. 2 at Rod Laver Arena, she still took positives from her first tournament since mid-November.
“Three weeks ago when I was in Auckland, at the end of last year, I was doing pool rehab,” Raducanu told reporters.
“To be on a court playing matches and competing is something I have to be grateful for. I started hitting when I came here 18 days ago. I have to take a positive that I was able to beat two top opponents in the first two rounds.”
“But I think today, no excuses of the back or physically. Yeah, I didn’t play well. She played very well. I think, given the preparation we had, we have to be grateful to be in this position.”
“Of course, I have a lot of things to take as feedback and work on.”
Raducanu said she was looking to for more consistency in 2025 and identified her serve as something that needed a bit of work after being broken five times by Swiatek on Saturday.
“I’m going to look back and be like, I learned a lot and got a lot of feedback on what I need to do better,” she said.
“I think the thing I want to improve is serving. The first two matches I got away with it against two top players because I was able to defend and move, use the rest of my game.”
“But I think that needs to improve.” – Rappler.com