Emma Raducanu has admitted she sometimes wishes she never won the US Open.
The 20-year-old recently opened up about the stresses of being a Grand Slam champion and suggested that certain people around her were using her like a “piggy bank”, likening them to “sharks”.
“You have to be on guard because there are a lot of sharks out there,” she said speaking to The Sunday Times. “I think people in the industry, especially with me because I was 19, now 20, they see me as a piggy bank.
“It has been difficult to navigate. I have been burned a few times,” she admitted. “I have learned, keep your circle as small as possible.”
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Raducanu shocked the world by romping to victory at Flushing Meadows in 2021, having reached the tournament as a mere qualifier.
She’s been in poor form ever since, partly due to recurring injury issues, and although she’s now one of the biggest sports stars in the country, it’s come at a hefty price.
Between her constant changing of coaches and her vast array of commercial commitments, fans have been quick to judge her, and while doing so isn’t exactly unjustified, Raducanu says the weight of expectation on her shoulders is often too much to bear.
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“I don’t think it is bad mentally to take a break, reset, and get really hungry for it again,” she said. “When I won [the US Open] I was extremely naive. What I have realised in the past two years, the tour and everything that comes with it, it’s not a very nice, trusting and safe space.”
The British-Romanian star, who is currently ranked 128th in the world, will miss Wimbledon and the US Open this year after having wrist and ankle surgery.
(Image: @EmmaRaducanu/Twitter)
“I’ve had a lot of setbacks, one after the other. I am resilient, my tolerance is high, but it’s not easy. And sometimes I think to myself I wish I’d never won the US Open, I wish that didn’t happen,” she admitted.
“Then I think, remember that feeling, remember that promise, because it was completely pure.”