Emma Raducanu has continued to fall in the WTA Ranking and risks dropping out of the Top 300 after a long absence from the sport due to injury and undergoing surgery.
2021 US Open champion Raducanu has not competed since the Stuttgart Open in April, where she lost to Jelena Ostapenko in the opening round. The 20-year-old then announced that she would be having surgery on her wrists and right ankle. Consequently, she has been absent from the sport since but has recently stated her intention to return in 2024.
In the meantime, she has dropped significantly in the WTA Ranking. Raducanu has a career-high ranking of World No. 10 but fell out of the top 200 for the first time in 27 months last week.
This week, Raducanu lost the 110 points that she received for making the 2022 Korea Open semi-finals. As a result, she fell a further 63 places to drop out of the Top 250 and land at No. 277, meaning she is now not too far away from dropping out of the Top 300.
However, Raducanu has reason to be hopeful for next season, as her absence means that she only played five tournaments this year and so will have a lot fewer ranking points to defend and everything to gain in 2024.
Former British No. 1 Laura Robson has shared her optimism regarding Raducanu's future in the sport.
"We know she has got the game to do it. She has the ball striking ability, she is a great mover and a great all-round player and she competes. All you can do is stay as healthy as possible and try to play as many matches as possible to see where you go.
"I wouldn’t want to put a date on it or put pressure on her to return at a certain point. As anyone who has had a long-term injury knows, you have a goal in your mind and it is always adjusting. You might think you are going to be ready to play at a certain date and you pick up a little niggle somewhere else in your body as you have been doing months and months of compensating.
"She can’t play a lot of tennis at the moment, but it’s a huge step forward and she seems so happy to be back on court, which is lovely to see. I’m sure she is gunning to get back out there because having to watch all the tournaments on TV is the hardest part," she said.
Raducanu is currently training Shenyang, China, as she prepares for her comeback.
Emma Raducanu says it was difficult to watch all the Grand Slams go by this year: “Next season I'll be back. This season all the slams were finished so it was difficult to watch them go by. But I was trying to stay in my lane as much as possible & keep focused on my recovery.”…
