As Emma Raducanu lined up to compete in the Australian Open for the first time in her career as a professional, reminders of her sheer inexperience were ever present. Despite being a grand slam champion herself, the encounter with Sloane Stephens would mark her first match against a grand slam champion. In the end, she contested just her third career three-set match at the top level.
It took a gripping 1 hour 45 minutes filled with tense, attritional exchanges, but Raducanu withstood a second set barrage from her opponent in a turbulent match to defeat Stephens 6-0, 2-6, 6-1 and reach the second round in Melbourne.
“I definitely wanted to go out there and start playing aggressively and start putting my game on the court,” said Raducanu. “I felt that I was actually just really enjoying my time here, especially like going out to practice earlier, I had quite a few people watching. So I was really enjoying it, and I think that the crowd that stayed pretty late, we were having a good time. I was feeding off that, for sure.”
Raducanu swept into the match with high intensity and energy from the beginning, and she accompanied her successes with big fistpumps and loud screams of “c’mon!” As she smothered Stephens with her return of serve, taking the ball early and refusing to relinquish the baseline, Stephens was barely present and she initially offered little resistance.
Raducanu finished how she started, bulldozing through the final set, and upon her victory ended her night by dropping her racket and covering her face in awe. “I think it was just a sense of pride,” she said. “I had some adversity with having Covid and then last week so I was just so proud to turn it around so fast. I think of my level last week – just seven days ago – and it was not good before the match in Sydney. And today I was actually pretty pleased with it so I was very happy with the way I turned it around.”
When asked afterwards about her first experience against a grand slam champion, Raducanu explained that she is viewing this season as a crucial step in her learning process, wherever it takes her. “I think 2022 is all about learning for me. Being in those situations of, you know, winning a set and then having to fight in a decider is definitely just all just accumulating into a bank of experience that I can tap into later on down the line. Yeah, very happy that today I can add to that.”
Afterwards, Stephens said that any similarities between them stop at the tournament they both won. She described Raducanu as “carrying a whole country”, a reference to the pressure she faces in Great Britain which is a completely different situation to her own. “I was talking to someone in the locker room and I’m like, ‘We’ll be here when she comes down,’ but not Emma, but just in general. Like, it all is like a cycle and I think learning how to deal with it early on is the best way to handle it just because there’s always a lot of ups and downs in tennis.”
Backing up big results is a universal challenge for tennis players and earlier in the day, Leylah Annie Fernandez, the beaten finalist in New York, also struggled as she lost in the first round to Australian wildcard Maddison Inglis. Fernandez has had considerably more experience at the top level. Raducanu took a nice step forward.
There are other things to learn about being a tennis player, such as simply when to go to sleep. Raducanu finished her match at midnight and her press did not conclude until well after 1.30am. “It’s way past my bedtime right now,” she said. “I think that it’s something I’m also learning about, myself and what works for me, dealing with those late finishes and the night matches and maybe not being able to get to sleep as early because of the adrenaline you’re running on. I think it will be a good experience learning from that.”
