"It's doable, not a dream" says British talent Sonay Kartal after Raducanu won the US Open

20-year-old Sonay Kartal has lavished praise on fellow Brit Emma Raducanu's unprecedented victory at the 2021 US Open as she demonstrated it's more than just a dream.

In an interview with the PA news agency, Kartal, a long-time rival of Raducanu on the junior circuit, admitted to having derived inspiration from Raducanu's title run. She revealed that it motivated her to believe that her own dreams are achievable:

"It has inspired me and I think I can speak for the others who grew up playing around her that it’s nothing but inspiration. a little kick that what we’re all trying to achieve, it’s doable, it’s not a dream that’s so unachievable. It was motivation for all of us.”

Emma Raducanu and Sonay Kartal built a rivalry of their own while competing in the UK as young girls. The latter recalled how they grew up playing each other and that she would often run into Raducanu in the finals of national-level tournaments.

"We grew up playing each other. I think my earliest memory is maybe under-nines up until under-14s. We’d be in the same national tournaments and we’d always end up meeting each other in the finals and we’d alternate almost every week who won.”