Emma Raducanu was comprehensively defeated in her first match of 2022 on the Sydney Tennis Traditional.
The 19-year-old misplaced in straight units 6-0 6-1 to Kazakh participant Elena Rybakina in her warm-up match earlier than the beginning of the Australian Open subsequent week.
Raducanu struggled to deal with Rybakina’s energy from the baseline and was very weak on her second serve, profitable solely 13 % of factors. Rybakina is ranked thirteenth within the WTA standings, 5 spots increased than Raducanu, however appeared the way more assured and constant participant right here.
Rybakina took the primary 9 video games to tug out an unassailable lead, earlier than Raducanu lastly put a one on the scoreboard to avoid wasting face. Reacting afterwards the US Open champion remained optimistic.
‘To play my first match towards her was clearly a tricky problem,’ Raducanu mentioned. ‘It simply confirmed me the place I’m at on this stage of coming again, recovering. I've had a tricky few weeks, however I’m feeling fairly constructive going ahead.’
After spending simply 56 minutes on court docket in her closing match earlier than the primary main of the 12 months subsequent week, Raducanu instantly headed to the observe courts.
‘I felt like I might have performed some issues higher within the match and I wished to try to repair it right away and simply go away with a greater feeling about it,’ she added.
Raducanu is recovering from Covid-19 after testing in the midst of December at a match in Abu Dhabi. Wimbledon winner Ash Barty and reigning champion Naomi Osaka are among the many favourites to take the crown in Melbourne.
World quantity two Aryna Sabalenka, in the meantime, encountered extra issues together with her function she suffered a shock loss to a qualifier on the Adelaide Worldwide 2 match.
In a possible blow to her confidence forward of the Australian Open, the Belarusian served 21 double faults as she went down 5-7 6-1 7-5 to world quantity 93 Rebecca Peterson within the first spherical.
Such had been her issues, the highest seed even served underarm at occasions within the second and third set.
It comes every week after she had 18 double faults in her loss to Kaja Juvan on the Adelaide Worldwide 1 occasion.
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