‘Very mature’ Emma Raducanu praised by British great after resurgent Wimbledon run
Emma Raducanu has been praised by former British No 1 Johanna Konta following some strong performances across the grass-court season.
The 21-year-old raised a few eyebrows with her decision earlier in the year to skip most of the clay season, including the French Open.
However, that decision has clearly paid dividends for Raducanu amid a resurgent few weeks.
The Brit is now set to climb back into the top 100 after reaching the last four of the Nottingham Open and the quarter-final of the Eastbourne International, before reaching round four at Wimbledon.
And former world No 4 Konta – who reached the Wimbledon semi-final in 2017 – has been impressed by Raducanu’s decision-making.
“I think this is where Emma’s really good and very mature,” said Konta.
“She has a thought, she has a direction in mind, and she goes for it and she makes the decision, and I think that’s a very mature approach for a young player.
“And the same thing with her coaching team. I wish I did that more where I felt like a coaching situation wasn’t working, I didn’t wait for it to run its course because of how I thought the media would start speaking about it.
“I really admire her for her conviction in how she goes about deciding things for her career.”
Raducanu’s SW19 run ended in a three-set loss to Lulu Sun in round four, but it was undeniably a huge step in the right direction.
It was the first time that she had reached week two of a major since her historic US Open win in 2021, and she beat established WTA players such as Elise Mertens and Maria Sakkari during her run.
And Konta believes that even in defeat, Raducanu should take plenty of encouragement from her campaign.
She added: “I think it’s great to see her again have four successive matches. I think her last match against Sun was actually really positive. I don’t think we’ve had enough of a chance to see Emma in a situation where a lot of resistance has been put up against her.
“I think it was actually positive to see her in that space, especially how she dealt with that first set where Sun played really smart against her. To then see Emma really get stuck into that second set and turn the momentum a bit.
“Ultimately I think in a player’s career this is where you spend most of your time. You’re not going to spend your career just rolling through everybody.
“She will start winning these matches more and more and I think that’s where your deep-rooted confidence in you as a competitor and you as a player and what you can do out there, how you can problem solve, really comes from.
“The more she can be here, I think the more resilient a player it will make her and ultimately I think it will be what makes her a really, really great tennis player.”
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