Emma Raducanu came into Queen’s with low expectations, having struggled with recurring back spasms over the last few weeks. Adjusting from clay to grass, two wildly different surfaces, was going to be a further challenge.
In her first two matches neither of those appeared to trouble her: she looked imperious against Cristina Bucsa, an opponent who got the better of her in Singapore earlier this year, and said afterwards her back was “in good shape” for that match. She was on the front foot for three-quarters of her second-round encounter with Rebecca Sramkova, and motored through the closing stages.
But from playing the world No 112 in Bucsa and a similarly-ranked player in Sramkova, only four places below her, facing Zheng Qinwen was a significant step up. It proved a step too far, as the Olympic champion won 6-2, 6-4.
Grass is not the world No 5’s favourite surface: last year she was one of the first-round shocks at Wimbledon, losing to eventual quarter-finalist – and conqueror of Raducanu – Lulu Sun. She only won one match on the surface last season, an improvement of zero in 2023. While Raducanu was the underdog going into this match, she also had the greater grass-court experience, having reached three quarter-finals on the turf in the last year.
But this was Zheng’s sixth quarter-final of the year, having gone a step further in Rome, and the Chinese player was fresh off a last-eight appearance at Roland-Garros, when she lost to Aryna Sabalenka. She made hard work of her previous encounter, against American McCartney Kessler, coming through in three topsy-turvy sets for her maiden grass win of the season.
Under sweltering sunshine in the Andy Murray Arena, Zheng faced a challenge of her own: quieting an utterly partisan crowd. She made that significantly harder for herself by changing her racquet midway through Raducanu’s first service game, then deciding to replace her shoes, at leisure, when 30-40 up the next time the Brit served.
The Queen’s Club is too genteel for boos, but there was plenty of tutting and a smattering of sarcastic clapping. And with every subsequent point that Raducanu won, the volume of the crowd’s celebrations clicked up a notch.
But that game marked the first turning point of the match. Raducanu’s spirited defence broke down under the sheer weight of Zheng’s shotmaking. The Olympic champion pummelled the ball like it had offended her personally. She was firmly in control and broke for a 4-2 lead. “She kind of took away one of my bigger strengths [returning],” Raducanu said afterwards. “I think I have a lot of work to do, to be honest.”
Something else Raducanu has had to battle with this week has been her own mind. She suffocated an increasingly miserable-looking Sramkova in the first set of their encounter, covering every inch of the court, and it seemed like the match would be over before the last stragglers had traipsed back in with their refill of Pimm’s.
But from 5-0 up in little over 20 minutes, suddenly Raducanu malfunctioned. As her opponent began to swing more freely, Raducanu tightened up, second-guessing her shots and spraying errors at every turn. She looked panicked. That 5-0, triple-break lead disappeared and it was only serving at 5-4 that she seemed to force herself back into the match.
She held, Sramkova’s brittle resolve crumbled, and Raducanu ran away with the second set – but not without a sigh of relief. And against Zheng, a ruthless competitor, that sort of slip would not go unpunished.
By the closing stages of the first set in their quarter-final, Raducanu seemed frazzled. She had chances to level proceedings, making inroads on Zheng’s serve several times, but seemed to lose her clarity of vision just when she needed it most. Break and set point down, she drew Zheng in with a delicate drop shot, but as the Chinese player slipped on the grass, Raducanu planted her reply straight into the net. It was a dispiriting end to the first half.
What was of greater concern was Raducanu receiving a medical timeout, evidently for her back issue, at the break between sets. The 22-year-old had looked unencumbered movement-wise during the set but evidently felt something.
Speaking after the match, she called it a “vulnerability”, and suggested the volume of time she had spent on court had impacted it. “I'm not overly concerned that it's something serious, but I know it's something that's very annoying and needs proper and careful management.”
Taped up, she returned to court. Onlookers may have feared a swift end to the match - but there was another twist in the tale. Zheng seemed undone by the break in play. Where the world No 5 had been blasting the lines previously, now she was missing by miles. The power went up a gear, the accuracy down one.
And Raducanu profited, breaking in the opening game, then backing up the break with a picture-perfect drop shot. The crowd made their exasperation known as, down 0-15 and trying to stem the tide, Zheng went off to change her racquet again. But Raducanu broke again to lead 3-0.
But as Zheng warmed up, and the sweltering heat gave way to a cooler evening, she battered her way back into the set, winning the next two games. Another racquet change proved predictably unpopular, right as Raducanu prepared to serve. “Now what?” came a mutter court-side.
Now the boos really did break out, along with a forceful round of “Come on Emma”. Raducanu held to love. Afterwards, she said, “I think the fact it happened three times on my serve, I feel like maybe something could have been done [by the umpire], but I'm not going to get into it.”
But as Zheng moved back into the ascendancy, the crowd grew restive. “Change your shoes, Emma,” came the cry as the Olympic champion led on serve. Halfway through the second set the wind picked up, causing problems for both players, and it was Zheng who doubled down on the intensity as Raducanu wilted. A double fault from the British No 1, down break point, put proceedings back on serve.
Another double fault, at 5-4, gave Zheng match point, but three beefy serves dragged Raducanu back from the brink. For all the vitriol the 22-year-old inspires online, there was no sign of it on the Andy Murray Arena, with a near-capacity crowd roaring her on. It wasn’t enough: Zheng proved equal to an ill-timed Raducanu drop shot, and the Brit fired a forehand long to concede the match.
It felt, in the manner of many of her recent defeats, an abrupt end to what had been a promising campaign. The Brit scarcely looked up as she headed off court, to a standing ovation.
Afterwards, Zheng complimented her opponent’s grass-court credentials, and apologised meekly for shoe-gate, explaining that she found running on the surface difficult. Grass subdued, she marches into the semi-finals.
For Raducanu, it will be a case of building up these shorter runs into something more substantial - but that will only be possible if her body, and her mind, cooperate.
She noted afterwards that she was focused on “actually improving” her game by staying competitive with the top players, rather than working specifically towards a seeding at the bigger tournaments as her ranking rises. But the two will naturally go hand in hand. Painful as this defeat might be, it shows her the path she must take to achieve what she wants.
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