Emma Raducanu

[Puja]

Is utterly ridiculous. Yet to drop a set in her second ever Grand Slam, including breezing through qualifying.

What I've been mostly impressed by is the head on her shoulders. When she went on her first run at Wimbledon and had that big last 16 match on Court 1, she felt the pressure and the crowd did not help. She faulted on her first serve and the stadium erupted with support and "Come on Emma!"s and it just made her more and more overwhelmed. You could see her buckling under the weight of it and it wasn't a surprise that she needed to pull out partway through.

Afterwards though, she impressed me by openly saying that it was the pressure and stress (entirely understandable in an 18 year old in her first ever big tournament!) that was responsible rather than some faked injury, and then from that clearly working on the issues for this tournament. She's under slightly less pressure away from being the Great British Hope at Wimbledon, but the Yank crowd have taken to her and loudly cheered her in some of the biggest tennis stadia on the planet and she's not looked fazed by it at all. Incredible composure and mental strength from one so young.

Puja

[fivepointer]

Astonishing effort to get through without dropping a set. Wimbledon hinted at a young player with considerable potential . Her performances at the US Open have simply confirmed that we have a special talent.

[switchskier]

Game live tonight on channel 4 apparently. Looking forward to watching for the first time since Wimbledon

[Which Tyler]

Game live tonight on channel 4 apparently. Looking forward to watching for the first time since Wimbledon

Hypecast starting at 8

[Puja]

Game live tonight on channel 4 apparently. Looking forward to watching for the first time since Wimbledon

Oh good! I have Amazon Prime, so I was going to watch it on that, but she deserves a network television audience.

Puja

[Which Tyler]

C'mon Emma!

[Which Tyler]

Huzzah!

Tha was an absolutely brilliant first set. Both players hitting the ball so cleanly, and aggressively, both showing an ability to come back from behind.

Also a kudos for Martina in commentary, really refreshing to hear such good analysis in play.

[Galfon]

Blood injury when serving for match, at break point for the gutsy Fernandez..drama indeed.

All over, what a machine.

[Which Tyler]

Fan-bloody-tastic.

What a match, and a well deserved win, slightly reminiscent of a young Federer (obviously the same level) in that you think she's playing to her absolute maximum, and then she hit 4 games where she just accelerates away from her previous form.

[Puja]

Fan-bloody-tastic.

What a match, and a well deserved win, slightly reminiscent of a young Federer (obviously the same level) in that you think she's playing to her absolute maximum, and then she hit 4 games where she just accelerates away from her previous form.

And, even better, there are still some areas where she can clearly improve - it was notable today that she didn't have any kind of overhead smash available to her cause she always let high balls come down, even when even a basic overhead would've put the point away. She's only 18 and so inexperienced, and yet she's pulling out performances and results like that.

What a terrific prospect.

Puja

[fivepointer]

A thrilling and brilliant win. The control, power, timing and movement of the players were things of wonder.

Great to hear Martina. How one yearned for some play at the net like her in her prime but that is considered old hat nowadays.

[Digby]

She is a terrific prospect, indeed she's terrific now. I would caveat of he matches this event she won an awful lot of the big points, and yes that's something the big players tend to do, but almost nothing would need to change and she could go out in the 2nd round, at which point I hope people have some patience.

They just aired some Pat Cash comments from after the game on 5Live and he was almost stuck repeating 'I can't believe it', and if you can do something that stops Cash from rabbiting on you've probably done something quite remarkable. This is somewhat taking to something like Cool Runnings, save Jamaica went on to win, it simply shouldn't happen

Her footwork is just awesome, she's so quickly into position and is looking to take the ball so early. And her % of returns in seemed bonkers to me, but I had been out drinking through the afternoon/early evening so perhaps got a bit fixated an inaccurate impression, though again it'd start with super fast footwork

[Digby]

Heard a nice story, which might already have been doing the rounds so apologies, about an 8-9 year old Raducanu. By that age her coaches had realised not maybe they had a future GS champion but clearly someone who stood out a little, and they don't just look at tennis but at physical abilities, and so they elected to have her do a press up challenge. Emma was given 1 minute to do as many press ups as she could and they said look don't worry you probably won't make it to the end of the minute, Emma promptly knocked 60 press ups in 60 seconds. The surprised coach enquired of Dad does she perhaps do press-ups at home, to which Dad said 'I didn't even know she knew what one was'.

Motor skills, physical skills, decision making and application, there's a reason these people aren't normal and are celebrated

[Numbers]

Fan-bloody-tastic.

What a match, and a well deserved win, slightly reminiscent of a young Federer (obviously the same level) in that you think she's playing to her absolute maximum, and then she hit 4 games where she just accelerates away from her previous form.

And, even better, there are still some areas where she can clearly improve - it was notable today that she didn't have any kind of overhead smash available to her cause she always let high balls come down, even when even a basic overhead would've put the point away. She's only 18 and so inexperienced, and yet she's pulling out performances and results like that.

What a terrific prospect.

Puja

I was screaming smash it at the telly which caused some giggling from my neighbours.

[Which Tyler]

Well played Emma - good to see her playing well, moving well, trusting her game and trusting her body - and my personal favourite attribute for any sportsperson - she's happy and visibly enjoys playing the game.

[Puja]

Well played Emma - good to see her playing well, moving well, trusting her game and trusting her body - and my personal favourite attribute for any sportsperson - she's happy and visibly enjoys playing the game.

Agreed. She's looked bloody miserable the last two years, with a combination of the intense pressure and injuries, and I was starting to resign myself to the idea that her body or brain was kaput and she wouldn't be able to play regularly, but the last few months have seen her coming back to herself and playing with a smile on her face.

Puja

[Which Tyler]

Never looked comfortable in her body today - wrist and back, then the left leg.
Only started grunting with full effort late in the second set, stopped again after the slip.
Body language after the slip was that the leg was okay, but that she needed reassurance of that - knee may have hyper extended, but mothing visible that would cause the ankle problems, had the knee, calf and ankle all examined, 1 paracetamol, and some lostening treatment on her back.

First couple of games after that break, she obviously didn't trust the leg, and she never got back to looking comfortable, and trusting her body.
Entirely understandable given her last couple of years, but really not helpful. Hope she's got a good sports psychologist, and that her physio is well versed in modern pain science.

[Puja]

Never looked comfortable in her body today - wrist and back, then the left leg.
Only started grunting with full effort late in the second set, stopped again after the slip.
Body language after the slip was that the leg was okay, but that she needed reassurance of that - knee may have hyper extended, but mothing visible that would cause the ankle problems, had the knee, calf and ankle all examined, 1 paracetamol, and some lostening treatment on her back.

First couple of games after that break, she obviously didn't trust the leg, and she never got back to looking comfortable, and trusting her body.
Entirely understandable given her last couple of years, but really not helpful. Hope she's got a good sports psychologist, and that her physio is well versed in modern pain science.

She took a nasty slip last match and didn't look comfortable from then onwards. Shame, but hopefully she's still building up. At least her wins mean she won't have to go through qualifying for the US Open.

Puja

[Banquo]

Never looked comfortable in her body today - wrist and back, then the left leg.
Only started grunting with full effort late in the second set, stopped again after the slip.
Body language after the slip was that the leg was okay, but that she needed reassurance of that - knee may have hyper extended, but mothing visible that would cause the ankle problems, had the knee, calf and ankle all examined, 1 paracetamol, and some lostening treatment on her back.

First couple of games after that break, she obviously didn't trust the leg, and she never got back to looking comfortable, and trusting her body.
Entirely understandable given her last couple of years, but really not helpful. Hope she's got a good sports psychologist, and that her physio is well versed in modern pain science.

her oppo was excellent though, so much power.

[Galfon]

Not quite there again, still appears not fully up for the full-on rigours of the GS/WTA tour but understandable with the injuries and coaching changes.She's had wins against a few top 10 players this year so not all bad.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/tennis/arti ... ge075lgyqo