WTA legend says one of ‘these two things’ is causing Emma Raducanu trouble

Kim Clijsters says only two reasons come to her mind when thinking about Emma Raducanu’s struggles as the former four-time Grand Slam champion believes the 21-year-old is either “guided by wrong people” or simply has a hard time dealing mentally with everything that has come her way.

After her historic 2021 US Open win and then struggling mightily with injuries and poor and inconsistent results, the Briton has been looking much better on the court this year since she has managed to remain healthy and also make some notable results. However, not everything is still ideal as the former world No. 10 has made some questionable decisions throughout the year which left everyone wondering what was the logic behind it.

When the clay season started, Raducanu made a solid start by reaching the Stuttgart quarterfinal before losing to world No. 1 Iga Swiatek. But then, she lost in the Madrid Open first round and decided not to play at the Rome Open and the French Open and miss the rest of the clay swing. Then, the British tennis player opted to skip the Paris Olympics so she could focus on the North American hard-court swing – but after playing in Washington – she stunningly missed the WTA 1000 tournaments in Toronto and Cincinnati although she was perfectly healthy.

That decision turned out to be a disastrous one since Raducanu got bounced by Sofia Kenin in the US Open first round and afterward cried. “There’s two things that I think could be the reason… it’s either maybe not having the right people around you who kind of guide you and say, ‘Okay, this is important to you like the scheduling, building enough weeks off in between, like training blocks to improve, to mentally switch off,'” Clijsters said on the Served with Andy Roddick podcast.

Or is it her? Is there other things going on mentally where she’s kind of just had it with media, pressure… whatever it is. It’s only those two things that could be the cause. I don’t know enough about her, I don’t know her personally, I don’t know her team, I really don’t know much about that whole situation. I’m sorry but if you have a team of coaches around you or whoever is in charge, there’s obviously some misguidance there.”

Another legend had the same take on Raducanu’s struggles
As mentioned above, the 21-year-old looked absolutely heartbroken and devastated after Kenin handed her a 6-1 3-6 6-4 loss in the first round at Flushing Meadows. When asked to comment on the Briton’s case, tennis icon Martina Navratilova suggested that the 2021 US Open winner needed to put herself in “charge” of everything – only work with people in which she has full trust – and that she needed to play more and raise her tolerance level for stress.

“Emma needs to be in charge and she’s old enough to know what she should be doing – surround herself with good people and then trust in them, and give it time so that you can see the results. Technically she is great, but she needs more matchplay. I still don’t think she is as fit as she should be. I feel like if you don’t want to play the Olympics because it’s a different surface, you need to fix your body. Maybe it’s just not equipped for this kind of stress. She needs to think long-term… not tomorrow or next week,” Navratilova explained.

Raducanu admitted that she made a mistake
After seeing her scheduling move being heavily criticized, the 21-year-old defended herself before the start of the US Open by claiming that she had some great practice sessions and that she knew what she was doing. But then, her run at Flushing Meadows ended in the earliest possible stage.

“I feel down, I feel sad. Obviously, this is a tournament I really want to do well in so…” the Briton said after her early exit in New York.

In the same press conference, an emotional Raducanu confessed that it would have probably been better to play more leading up to the final Grand Slam of the season and indicated that she would try to make smarter scheduling decisions in the future.

“I was maybe a bit slow starting. Yeah, I would have preferred to probably play, a little bit more before coming into the US Open. You know, I know when I have a lot of matches, just like every player, you feel really good. You feel like everything’s automatic. So yeah, I think I can learn from it. And you know my manage my schedule slightly differently,” Raducanu noted.