Emma Raducanu looks beyond fixated behavior ordeal: ‘It taught me the strength that I have’

For Emma Raducanu, a year that began in trying circumstances is ending in a much happier place. Not necessarily because of the solid results that helped her almost halve her ranking, from No. 56 on Jan. 1 to No. 29 now, but because of how much lighter she is feeling.

In March, the 23-year-old told reporters in Indian Wells, Calif. that a spectator exhibiting fixated behavior toward her at a tournament in Dubai, United Arab Emirates had left her rarely leaving the house and looking down at the ground when she did. Ten months on, Raducanu has retaken control of life on and off the court.

“My neck doesn’t hurt as much,” a relaxed Raducanu last week told a group of reporters at the National Tennis Centre in southwest London, as she explained that rather than holing up at home during the offseason, she has been taking regular trips into central London. “I’m not looking down as much. Better posture. But I’m like, ‘OK, are they going to see me on the tube?’ It’s not a bad thing. People take the tube, it’s fine.

“If people recognize me, if people see me, and they want to come up to me, then that’s great, but I don’t necessarily feel like I’m hiding from anything anymore.

“I’ve learned a lot about myself this year. I think the start of the year was not very smooth. I think I went through some very difficult times on and off the court … But I think it really taught me the strength that I have to pull myself out of it. Also what I need to do to avoid falling back in again.”

Raducanu broke down in tears mid-match against Karolína Muchová at the Dubai Tennis Championships, after spotting a man who had given her a letter and asked for a photo the previous day. She had noticed the man at a number of her previous events, and he was subsequently given a restraining order and taken off the list of applicants for Wimbledon ballot tickets.

Raducanu is one of a number of WTA Tour players who have recounted experiences with stalkers, or fixated persons, this year. Iga Świątek, Muchová and Yulia Putintseva all experienced different forms of on-court harassment during practice or matches, while Eva Lys said last month that people have “got hold of the addresses of training facilities, hotels and even room numbers” during the course of her career.

In Indian Wells, Raducanu revealed that she “couldn’t see the ball through tears” and could “barely breathe” against Muchová in Dubai, and that she had developed neck pains from having to keep her head down while out in public in England.

“Honestly, I have gotten over it,” Raducanu said of the incident last week. She added that she was “creeped out” by being photographed by paparazzi without her realising on the way to watch the England rugby team in November — she also trained with the players and went into the dressing room after their win against New Zealand — but said that she feels safe when out and about.

“I feel good because someone’s always watching my back,” she said metaphorically of the support she has.

Raducanu will enter next season with the support of Francisco Roig, the longtime former coach of 22-time Grand Slam champion Rafael Nadal. Roig started working with the Brit this summer. Raducanu is learning Spanish and brushing up on her French — the former assisted by the odd instruction from Roig in his native tongue — and is working with the coach to impose herself more on matches.

Still synonymous with the ultimate tennis upset, winning the U.S. Open as a qualifier four years ago without dropping a set, Raducanu’s 2025 was largely defined by beating players she should beat but losing, sometimes crushingly, to those ranked above her. Raducanu’s career record against top-10 players is 3-17, and her Grand Slam defeats this year were to major champions Świątek (twice), Aryna Sabalenka and Elena Rybakina. Only against Sabalenka, in a night-time thriller at Wimbledon, was Raducanu competitive; she won four games in total in her two matches against Świątek. Three of those losses were in third-round matches, one was a second-round match.

This season’s results helped Raducanu stabilize after a hugely up-and-down start to her career — a Grand Slam title followed by multiple surgeries and a drop outside the world’s top 300. She this year reached her highest ranking since those U.S. Open points from 2021 fell off a year later. Raducanu’s ranking means she’ll be seeded for the Australian Open in January.

Now, she said, it’s about challenging the very best.

“Being able to dictate the game a lot more is a goal of mine,” Raducanu said.  “So I don’t necessarily have to run as much.

“I developed some skills in defense, some awkward skills, which I’m always going to have to use. But I think my goal with him [Roig] for next year is going to try and take a bit more control of the points. Not in an overly aggressive way, just pretty controlled, moving the ball around. And I think my match with Jessica Pegula in Beijing was a pretty good example of how I would want to kind of play going forward. I think I was very proactive in switching up the flights, the spins and being aggressive when I could. So I think just bringing in some new variety, but also not necessarily running all the time.”

Raducanu said she ultimately wants to build her base level so she can focus more on herself, and less on her opponents.

“The ideal is that you don’t have to necessarily think too much about the other players, and you can just go and execute your game and know that you can win,” she said.

She acknowledged that she doesn’t necessarily have the weapons of some of her rivals, but said that she will keep working to improve her serve.

“I also think that with Francis, he’s trying to build a better quality, not necessarily by changing my physiological capacities, just by using better technique, using better timing and using better movement.”

Emma Stewart, an experienced physio who helped the British Rowing team claim eight medals at last year’s Paris Olympics, will also join Raducanu’s team alongside Roig. Stewart, who used to work for the WTA, will replace Yutaka Nakamura, who Raducanu joined up with a year ago but who left the team before the end of this season. Jane O’Donoghue, the former LTA coach turned financial worker who Raducanu often refers to as “a big sister,” returned to her job with the Bank of Canada having taken a sabbatical this year to support Raducanu alongside temporary coach Mark Petchey.

The team will take shape for a pre-season training block in Barcelona over the next few weeks, with Raducanu having pulled out of exhibition events in the U.S. with a bone bruise in her heel.

She’s not yet ready to train flat out but is building it up ahead of the start of the 2026 season, which will begin for her with the United Cup in early January.

But as 2025 draws to a close, there’s also time for reflection. “Learning about myself has been a great thing,” Raducanu said. “So I feel very content, and I’m very pleased and grateful also for the great friends I’ve had.”

This article originally appeared in The Athletic.

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