Seoul: Emma Raducanu dismantles No. 8 seed, sets up potential QF vs top seed
Emma Raducanu has been through to the Seoul quarterfinal after delivering a great performance to oust No. 8 seed Yue Yuan 6-4 6-3. Playing against the 40th-ranked Chinese for the first time in her career, the unseeded Briton led from start to finish as her win was never really a doubt.
Although the 2021 US Open champion got broken once in the first set and twice in the second set, her serve worked pretty well for the most part as she fired 11 aces and also won 70 percent of her first serve points. Now, Raducanu could potentially meet top-seeded Daria Kasatkina next as for a place in the Seoul semifinal she will battle the winner of the match between the Russian and Hailey Baptiste – that clash is next on the schedule.
How Raducanu beat Yuan?
Early in the first set, the former world No. 1 blew an early break – then missed out on break points in the fifth and seventh games – but managed to keep her focus and break the No. 8 seed again in the game for a 5-4 lead before serving out for the opener in the following game.
After winning the last two games of the first set, the 21-year-old also started the next set with back-to-back breaks and a 3-0 lead. Down by a set and two breaks, Yuan managed to get one break back in the fourth game but the 21-year-old kept pressing and again went up by two breaks in the seventh game when she opened a 5-2 lead.
But when the time came for the Briton to serve out for the match, she started struggling a bit to close out Yuan as she didn’t convert any of her five match points in the eighth game. However, Raducanu was able to keep her focus and she put a curtain on the match in the following game after converting her seventh match point.
