“I trust my body a lot more now,” Emma Raducanu said after she withdrew from the Korea Open midway due to an injury. The former US Open champion suffered a foot injury during her quarterfinal encounter against Daria Kasatkina due to which she was forced to retire after losing the first set 6-1. Injury troubles haven’t been new to the British star, who remained sidelined for most of the 2023 season. Nonetheless, she is working hard to make a comeback as early as the latter half of the Asian Swing.
Earlier this week, Raducanu pulled out of the Wuhan Open, a WTA 1000 tournament. She was slated to play in the qualifying rounds but didn’t recover completely from her foot injury. As a result, Raducanu could be looking at the tournaments later this month to make a comeback on the court.
Interestingly, there are four more tournaments slated to take place in China after the Wuhan Open. The WTA 500 Ningbo Open starts on October 14 while Guangzhou Open, a WTA 250 event takes place a week later from the Ningbo Open. Following these events, the Hong Kong Tennis Open and Jiangxi Open will take place. As a result, it is a golden opportunity for Raducanu to plan her schedule with four events in the same country.
Another important factor why Raducanu will be looking to make a comeback as soon as possible is her WTA ranking. Currently, the British star lies in the 54th spot and she will be eager to finish the season inside the top 50. In the past, the Asian Swing has been a good hunting ground for her. Thus, Raducanu missing tournaments here has irked a tennis bigwig.
Emma Raducanu urged to ‘get out there and play’
In the recent past, Raducanu has invited criticism for skipping the qualifying rounds and withdrawing from the tournaments instead. For those unknown, she refused to play in the qualifying rounds of the Canadian Open and the Cincinnati Open, which didn’t go down well with many. Thus, when she pulled out of the qualifying rounds of the Wuhan Open, Kieron Vorster, a renowned coach couldn’t help but voice his displeasure at Raducanu’s plans.
Vorster revealed, “She just doesn’t play enough matches. She plays an abbreviated clay court season, because she’s got a long grass court season and hard court season coming up and she doesn’t want to be burnt out or get injured… I think there could potentially be a lot of ‘yes’ people around her, instead of people telling her what she doesn’t want to hear, ‘You know what, Emma, you need to get out there and play’.”
Nonetheless, Raducanu has maintained that she will be back to competing ‘as soon as she can.’ She was outside the top 300 of the WTA rankings earlier this season but has fought her way back to the 54th position now. The British star would be eagerly waiting for her comeback, like her fans and claw her way back among the top players in the world.
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