Emma Raducanu faces tricky path at Ningbo Open with potential clash against world number 5

With the Ningbo Open set to begin next week, the draw has been revealed, featuring some fascinating potential encounters, including British tennis star Emma Raducanu. The US Open winner will face world number 230 Chinese tennis player Lin Zhu in her first round.

Lin Zhu has a 19-15 record so far in 2025, and will be looking to impress in front of her hometown crowd. On the other hand, Emma Raducanu may want to bounce back from last week at the Wuhan Open 500, where the Brit was forced to retire in a 1-6, 1-4 match against world number 46 Ann Li.

If Emma can manage to get past Lin Zhu, her second round will be against a tougher opponent as she will face Mirra Andreeva who gets a bye from the first round. The 18 year old has had quite a strong year with a 40-15 record in 2025 where she managed to win both the Dubai Open and Indian Wells back to back at the beginning of this year.

However, if Raducanu remains healthy, she may thrive off the fact that Andreeva has been slightly off form, only going 2-2 during the Asian swing, with her losing her last match 7-6 (4), 6-3, 6-3 in a first round battle against German doubles specialist Laura Siegemund.

Looking at the history of this first round match up, it seems both Emma Raducanu and Lin Zhu have never played each other before. Despite both being on the tour for multiple years, neither has ever crossed paths until the Ningbo Open, so it will be a new experience on both sides of the tennis court. Lin Zhu seems to have played mostly hard courts in 2025, with a final appearance at the Guiyang ITF, where she unfortunately lost to the top seed at the event, Chinese compatriot Hanyu Guo.

Looking forward to the potential second round match up at the Ningbo Open, Emma Raducanu and Mirra Andreeva have actually also both never faced each other. However, this makes more sense due to Andreeva only just joining the WTA tour properly not too long ago combined with Emma's inconsistent tennis action.

In 2025, Raducanu advanced into the third round of Wimbledon, the US Open and the Australian Open, which were her best Grand Slam runs for this season. In the Asian swing, the 2021 US Open champion started at the Korean Open, where she was beaten by Barbora Krejcikova in her second game after defeating Jaqueline Cristian in her first round match. Afterwards, the Brit went to the China Open, where Raducanu unfortunately succumbed to Jessica Pegula after beating Cristina Bucsa two days earlier. Finally, as previously aforementioned, the 22-year-old was forced to retire during her opening match of the Wuhan Open as she went head-to-head with Ann Li last week.

Meanwhile, Mirra Andreeva has had a mixed bag of an Asian swing in 2025. The Russian began her tour of Asia at the Beijing Open 1000 event, where she did win her first two rounds in convincing displays against Raducanu's first round opponent Lin Zhu (won 6-2, 6-2) and Jessica Bouzas-Maneiro (6-4, 6-1). Nevertheless, she faced a heartbreaking loss against Emma Raducanu's British compatriot Sonay Kartal as she lost 7-5, 2-6, 7-5 in the round of 16.

All in all, the tail end of this season has showcased some interesting displays of form and ferocity for players looking for a post season rankings boost. For WTA tennis stars featuring at the Ningbo Open, all entrants will be looking to end the season successfully and fans/spectators will have a close eye on Emma Raducanu's form going into this event.