Karolina Muchova shares account of ‘strange’ Emma Raducanu incident in Dubai
Karolina Muchova has called the incident, in which a man displayed ‘fixated behaviour’ towards Emma Raducanu during the Czech’s match against the Brit, a ‘strange experience.’
Muchova defeated McCartney Kessler 6-3, 1-6, 7-6(5) in the round of 16 at the WTA 1000 event in Dubai, but it was the incident during her opening match against Raducanu that has caught headlines.
At 2-0 during their match, the 2021 US Open champion appeared in distress, displaying tears as she talked to the umpire. It was later revealed that a man in the crowd had exhibited ‘fixated behaviour’ towards Raducanu, having already approached the Brit the day before.
“Yeah, it was strange situation,” said Muchova.
“I honestly went for my serving. I didn’t even know something was happening. Then I saw she’s not on the other side. So I went to check with the referee what is happening. She told me what is happening.
“Yeah, obviously you don’t want to see these things to be happening to anyone, to any woman, any girl. So I was just trying to be there, maybe calm her down a little bit.
“I’m happy they solved it pretty fast. I think she was fine after a while. Then we just kept going with the match.”
The Dubai quarterfinalist commented that she had not personally experienced anything similar to the incident: “I’m lucky around me it’s nice fans usually. Yeah, I wasn’t in the situation. Again, I felt sorry for her and for anyone who has to go through this.
“Obviously there are people texting us after matches all the time. Sometimes not the nicest messages. But never it happened to me that someone would like actually approach me live. Yeah, I guess I’m lucky it didn’t happen to me.”
Despite the horrific incident, the Brit battled on – eventually losing 7-6(6), 6-4 to her opponent.
Latest WTA News
Elena Rybakina’s banned coach Stefano Vukov threatened to sue former world No 1
‘Difficult experience’ – Emma Raducanu speaks for first time since distressing Dubai incident
A few days later, Raducanu took to her Instagram to release her first statement: “Thank you for the messages of support. Difficult experience yesterday (Tuesday) but I’ll be okay and proud of how I came back and competed despite what happened at the start of the match,” the Brit wrote.
“Thank you to Karolina for being a great sport and best of luck to her for the rest of the tournament.”
“On Monday, February 17, Emma Raducanu was approached in a public area by a man who exhibited fixated behaviour,” the official WTA statement said.
“This same individual was identified in the first few rows during Emma’s match on Tuesday at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships and subsequently ejected. He will be banned from all WTA events pending a threat assessment.”
Karolina Muchova will next face Sorana Cirstea in the quarterfinals of the WTA 1000 in Dubai.
The Czech leads their head-to-head 4-1, winning the last two meetings, and being victorious during their 2023 match at the same event.
