Injury concern for Raducanu again as she loses to Kalinina
British No 1’s fightback fails as she struggles with back pain Last-16 clash ends in defeat by Ukrainian world No 37
Physical frailties again surfaced in Emma Raducanu’s story as she missed a fine opportunity to move into the quarter-finals of the Mutua Madrid Open – the biggest tournament in Europe outside the grand slams.
Raducanu complained of a stiff back during a three-set loss to the powerful Ukrainian player Anhelina Kalinina. She took a medical timeout after being dominated by Kalinina in the opening set, and managed to turn the match around. But then, as the players moved into the home straight, her lack of endurance told.
“I went into the match with it,” said Raducanu afterwards, when asked about her back trouble. “The whole week I have been having some problems with my body and small niggles that I have been managing. Like the day before my lastround match [against Marta Kostyuk on Sunday] I didn’t practise, because I was just trying to manage my body and I was having some pains. I was really struggling to move out wide, to be honest.
“I felt like when I was out wide, I just had to go for it and hope for the best, because I wasn’t really in a position to be running. But credit to her – she gave me nothing either.”
Happily, Raducanu seemed to think that there was no likelihood of a long lay-off. “I’m feeling pretty positive,” she said. “A lot of the time with me it’s just overload and then two or three days’ complete rest and I’m OK to start training again. The plan is to still go to Rome [which starts in just over a week].
“I would have given myself a five per cent chance of winning that match, and for it to almost happen, I think that was a positive thing. After the time-out, I don’t know what magic they worked, but I had a numb back for the second and third set so I couldn’t feel anything.”
This was a feisty encounter that featured plenty of twists, as well as a heated exchange between Kalinina and chair umpire Miriam Bley when the world No37 wanted to take a bathroom break at the end of the second set. Perhaps that was Kalinina’s way of returning the favour, having lost her own rhythm while Raducanu left the court after the first set. Whatever the explanation, the pendulum duly swing again, with Kalinina rediscovering her former poise and timing as she swept to a 6-2, 2-6, 6-4 victory in 2hr 18min.
Kalinina is 25 years old, a former journeywoman from the lower levels of the game who has transformed her fortunes over the past 12 months. Had these two faced off at the same stage of 2021, Kalinina would have been ranked in the 160s, while Raducanu did not even have a point to her name.
With the roof of the Caja Magica closed because of thunderstorms, conditions felt noticeably slower than they had during Raducanu’s previous two wins (over the Czech Republic’s Tereza Martincova and Kostyuk). Time and again, she would hit what promised to be a clean winner, only for Kalinina to somehow conjure the ball back into play – or even match it with a decisive strike of her own.
Watching on from the courtside boxes was Louis Cayer, the Lawn Tennis Association doubles coach who is acting as Raducanu’s “technical consultant”.
Last night, Cayer might have noted that his new client does not always remember the first rule of clay-court tennis: you have to shape the ball with plenty of top-spin. In the first set, Raducanu was far too flat in her groundstrokes, while Kalinina’s ball-strike was decisive in every way: powerful, heavy and accurate. When the ball came off her racket, it made a deep and resonant sound, like John Bonham banging his bass drum.
From the medical time-out onwards, Raducanu lifted her level. She fought tigerishly and came up with some stunning winners, but in the bread-and-butter cross-court rallies she was more likely to be pushed back than her older and stronger opponent.
The third set was by far the most riveting part of the match. Although Kalinina had dropped her own level in the second, she was now back on song. And the song she played was a kind of tennis heavy metal. Even her outfit, which started out as a baggy grey T-shirt and equally loose-fitting shorts, looked like something a roadie might wear.
At least there was no suggestion of Raducanu choking this time. Admittedly, she is now zero for five this season when she loses the first set – which says something about the reserves of stamina she still needs to develop.
But this was not like the end of her hard-court season, which found her failing to serve out victories in three successive tournaments.
Last night, Raducanu came back from 3-1 down in the decider to level at 4-4. But then Kalinina pushed on again, and she simply did not have the puff to keep up.
Still, this was not a bad week for Raducanu overall. Two solid wins have carried her into the top 50 of the WTA Race – a rankings chart based on performances in 2022 alone. If she was not already the US Open champion, British tennis would be exultant.