Emma Raducanu gives update on pre-season and 2022 tennis schedule after Royal Albert Hall appearance
She enjoyed a short break during which she “completely switched off”, but US Open champion Emma Raducanu is back in training and preparing for the 2022 tennis season.
The 19-year-old had a stellar debut campaign as she became the first qualifier to go all the way at a Grand Slam, winning 10 matches en route to lifting the US Open trophy at Flushing Meadows.
She finished the year at a career-high No 19 in the WTA Rankings with her last match of the season a first-round defeat at the Upper Austria Linz Ladies at the beginning of November.
Raducanu, though, enjoyed a few days off following her final event, but she returned to training last week.
On Sunday she played her first match on British soil since June as she took on Elena-Gabriela Ruse from Romania in The Champions Tennis exhibition event at the Royal Albert Hall.
After coming out on top with a 6-3, 7-6 (7-3) victory, she revealed her schedule for the next few weeks.
“Six days I just completely switched off and I started my pre-season this week on Tuesday, but I’ve been doing a lot of fitness and not so much tennis so I was a bit nervous coming out to play in front of everyone here,” she said.
“I’m doing a pre-season and working hard on my fitness. As you can tell, I need to work with my sprints to the net as I was getting drop-shotted.”
She will next be in action at the Mubadala World Tennis Championship in Abu Dhabi in December before heading to Australia for the season-opening Grand Slam.
She added: “So I’m doing that and then I’m heading out to the Middle East to finish my pre-season and then Christmas out there and flying to Australia from there on the 27th.”
