Emma Raducanu remains hopeful she will be ready to compete at the Australian Open, which begins next Monday, as she attempts to recover from the ankle injury suffered last week.
In a video interview with Tennis Australia, Raducanu spoke about her prospects for the first time since arriving in Melbourne. “I’m just taking a day at a time. We’ll see hopefully by Monday I’ll be OK and ready,” she said. “But we’re just taking it a day at a time and not trying to expect too much at this point.”
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Raducanu completed a tentative practice at Melbourne Park on Monday afternoon with her trial coach, Sebastian Sachs, and her physio, Will Herbert, present. Raducanu maintains the rolled ankle she sustained in her second-round match against Viktoria Kuzmova in Auckland, her second match of the year, was a slice of bad luck she could not avoid.
“It was really unfortunate last week because I was feeling great about my season. I was feeling really good with the preparation I did physically,” she said. “And I just had an accident on the court, which I don’t know what I could have done to really prevent that.”
Meanwhile, Jack Draper reached the second round in Adelaide with a comprehensive 6-4, 6-2 win over Italy’s Lorenzo Sonego, while the fifth seed Dan Evans fell 7-5, 7-5 to MacKenzie McDonald in the first round.
In the Australian Open qualifiers, Heather Watson was defeated 7-6 (4), 6-3 by Aliona Bolsova Zadoinov.
