Emma Raducanu has won her first match at the Miami Open and now she has a chance to achieve one of her big targets for 2025 if she wins her next two matches.
Raducanu put her poor form of recent weeks behind her as she stormed into the second round of the Miami Open with a dominant 6-2, 6-1 victory over Sayaka Ishii.
This may not have been a big test for Raducanu against a player could not not handle her power and struggled in every service game as she ended up being broken five times.
Raducanu will take confidence from only her fourth win in her tenth match of what has been a stop-start season, with her rankings slide averted for now.
The 2021 US Open champion slipped down to No 60 in the WTA Rankings after her first round exit against Moyuka Uchijima in Indian Wells earlier this month.
Her performance in that match against Uchijima was laced with errors, as she struggled to deal with windy conditions, but this was a much more comfortable environment for Raducanu to get a morale-boosting win on her record.
“I’m very pleased to have got through that, it’s not easy to play someone in the first round who’s younger, dangerous and in good form,” Raducanu told Sky Sports.
“I’m really proud of how I competed today, it hasn’t been easy for me coming into this but I think I put out a really good performance.”
After failing to play at the Miami Open last year due to injury, this win against Ishii ensured Raducanu made a leap up the rankings and she is now closing in on a return to the top 50.
Raducuanu climbed into the top 10 of the WTA Rankings in 2022, but sustaining that level of success has proved to be tough for the 22-year-old due to dips in form and a succession of injuries.
Now she appears to be injury-free and that will give her confidence of putting up a strong showing against No 8 seed Emma Navarro in the next round.
“She’s got to be happy with that,” declared former British No 1 Annabel Croft, as she assessed Raducanu’s first win at the Miami Open.
“When you consider how few matches she has won on the WTA Tour in 2025, it’s all about getting some building blocks in place and building some confidence.
“She needs to go and start playing withs some freedom and she wasn’t given much of a test today.
“It’s difficult to really judge where he level was at. She got a lot of balls in play, I loved the way she was throwing in the sliced backhands and she served really well against someone who was really inexperienced at this level.
“Any win always feels good and we know the next match will be a real test. She is up against Navarro and there will be no pressure on her against a top 10 player.”
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With limited ranking points to defend from the 2024 clay court season, Raducanu has a big chance to rise up the WTA Rankings over the next couple of months.
A bulk of the points current on her WTA Ranking came from her good runs in front of her home British fans on the grass in June and July last year.
So she will want to have built up plenty of points in Miami and on clay courts before the grass court season rolls around.
The post Emma Raducanu close to rankings breakthrough after milestone Miami Open win appeared first on Tennis365.
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