MSometimes the memory of an entire game purrs down to a single moment, and it was just wonderful. Emma Raducanu had given six match points in her first round game, visibly nervous and nervous as she reached for a ball that seemed to fly over her.
Get F + for 3 months for 1 euro per week and read all the articles on FAZ.NET.
READ F + NOW
She caught him with his back to the net standing high above her head and gave him just enough momentum that he fell to the ground like a cotton ball on the other side. A magic stroke. The audience cheered, she smiled, but returned from the fairy tale world to reality. To the seventh match point, and it was all right.
It was a tailor-made start for the 18-year-old British woman. After three games without losing a set in the qualification at the debut in New York, the next win in two sets, and the rapid journey continues unabated. In mid-June, Emma Raducanu, the daughter of a Chinese woman and a Romanian, was born in Canada and landed in England at the age of two, and was ranked 338th in the world.
Then she floated into the round of 16 with a wildcard at the first Grand Slam tournament of her young life in Wimbledon, after further victories she climbed to 150th place before the start of the US Open, and after the tournament she will be at least 120th place. The British are delighted; it already landed on the front pages at Wimbledon. She was twice allowed as a debutante on Court No. 1, the little brother of the famous Center Court, only the end didn’t quite match the magical beginning. Suddenly she couldn’t breathe in the round of 16, and on the advice of the doctors, she gave up.
Courageous, powerful and skillful
In New York, too, she almost immediately landed in the second largest arena, the Louis Armstrong Stadium, but because the originally drawn American Jennifer Brady withdrew injured, Emma Raducanu and the Swiss opponent Stefanie Vögele met on Court 17. “Pity”, she said afterwards, “I would have loved to play Armstrong.” But that will surely happen soon, if not this year, then next year.
Flushing Meadows knows about girls who turn the lights on at a very young age; Tracy Austin was 14 when she made the quarter-finals on her debut, Jennifer Capriati and Martina Hingis were the same age when they won the first rounds, Stefanie Graf was 16 when she made it to the semi-finals, and Serena Williams won the second try at 17 Title. But those days are over.
On average, most debutantes are older now, and Emma Raducanu fits into that pattern. In November she will be 19 years old, you are no longer a child, but she still has the aura of childlike amazement, spontaneous, unaffected joy and lively spontaneity. In the game, she is brave, powerful and skillful, and accompanied by rays, which is quite unique.
A lot of discipline and respect from the mother
The British can’t wait to see what can become of the whole story, in any case the balloons of dreams are flying pretty high. Raducanu is promoted to the highest level by the British Tennis Association, and for almost six months she has had a coach that everyone in tennis circles on the island knows. The man’s name is Nigel Sears, who previously looked after Ana Ivanovic, among others, is the father-in-law of a certain Andy Murray and said at Wimbledon about the prospects of his young student: “You honestly? There are no upper limits – and I’ve been thinking that since the first day of our collaboration. “
Dealing with such comments and often overwhelming expectations is of course not easy. But Emma Raducanu gives the impression that she has both feet firmly on the ground and soaks up everything that this life on the stage of tennis has to offer her. She says her parents’ mentality helps her keep track of things. “They both come from countries where people work hard, and my mum instilled a lot of discipline and respect for other people into me.”
These days she walks through the city with big eyes, even if New York looks so much emptier than usual, wants to stay as long as she can and doesn’t have the feeling that she has to prove anything to anyone. Which does not mean that she is not determined to look ahead to the next round, this Thursday against the Chinese Zhang Shuai. She gets along well with many of the Chinese women in the truest sense of the word, because she speaks fluent Mandarin, her mother’s language. But even if she doesn’t say anything, just steps onto a tennis court, the sun rises. If not all is wrong, Emma Raducanu will bring a lot of joy to the planet tennis.
.
