As starts to the British summer go, it doesn\u2019t get much better than an hour in-and-out under the west London<\/a> sun. Refreshed and rejuvenated after a two-week break following the French Open \u2013 and a thrashing<\/a> at the hands of Iga Swiatek \u2013 Emma Raducanu<\/a> has all her sights set on a prosperous month with the pristine grass under her feet. And here at Queen\u2019s Club<\/a>, sporting a claret outfit, she did not let slip a purple patch on court. <\/p>\n Will there be bigger tests than world No 112 Cristina Bucsa? Of course. A fortuitous draw still needs capitalising on, though, and Raducanu excelled and looked supremely at home in a 6-1, 6-2 demolition job. Yet, most strikingly of all, in a year which included a horrendous stalking ordeal<\/a>, was how much she seemed to enjoy the limelight once again. <\/p>\n \u201cI must say I was quite locked in today,\u201d Raducanu said on court afterwards. \u201cI\u2019m still trying to find my groove on this surface. I actually lost to Cristina earlier in the year, so I was really trying to fight and get into the second round. <\/p>\n open image in gallery<\/p>\n Emma Raducanu cruised to a first round victory at Queen\u2019s (Getty)<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s incredibly special [to play at Queen\u2019s]. For us girls to have the tournament here finally, after watching the TV and the men play, is really nice.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s a noteworthy fortnight for Raducanu, ahead of the habitual significance of a Wimbledon<\/a> fortnight as a British player. Currently ranked 37 in the world, the 22-year-old is five spots away from a seeding at SW19, which would effectively hand her an easier route on paper to the third round. It is a benefit she has not exhibited since her 2022 season, when she was seeded at the grand slams purely as a result of her unfathomable 2021 US Open triumph. <\/p>\n As such, she\u2019s opted not to play at home in Nottingham (WTA 250) next week and has instead accepted a wild card at the higher-rated Berlin Open (WTA 500). The hope is that a strong run \u2013 likely semi-finals or further \u2013 either here at Queen\u2019s or next week in Germany, could be enough to crack that highly-coveted top-32. <\/p>\n Intriguingly, compatriot and doubles partner<\/a> this week, Katie Boulter <\/a>(world No 34 and thus, British No 1), is similarly eyeing a seeding at Wimbledon<\/a>. Yet where Boulter toiled and stumbled to a tense first-round win<\/a> against Ajla Tomljanovic in three sets earlier, Raducanu oozed composure and class. From the off, the 22-year-old was lasered in. <\/p>\n She made her move early. With new coach Mark Petchey watching on, having hopped over quickly from Paris after commentary duties at Roland Garros, alongside old coach Nick Cavaday, the Briton dominated her opponent in the back-of-the-court exchanges, with her forehand cross-court thriving in particular. <\/p>\n An early break at 2-1 was secured with an old-school slice approach and volley put-away on the backhand side, triggering a Raducanu smile that was so endearing on that memorable run in New York. <\/p>\n Get 4 months free with ExpressVPN<\/p>\n Servers in 105 Countries Try for free<\/a><\/p>\n ADVERTISEMENT. If you sign up to this service we will earn commission. This revenue helps to fund journalism across The Independent.<\/p>\n Get 4 months free with ExpressVPN<\/p>\n Servers in 105 Countries Try for free<\/a><\/p>\n ADVERTISEMENT. If you sign up to this service we will earn commission. This revenue helps to fund journalism across The Independent.<\/p>\n open image in gallery<\/p>\n Raducanu thrived in her opening match in west London (Getty) open image in gallery<\/p>\n The 22-year-old came through 6-1 6-2 in just over an hour (Getty)<\/p>\n A second break soon followed, Raducanu cracking her groundstrokes with venom and accuracy hand in hand, to the delight of a near-full Andy Murray Arena. Twenty-four minutes was all she needed to clinch the opening set. <\/p>\n She started the second set as she finished the first, buoyantly smashing two forehand winners off Bucsa\u2019s serve to set up an immediate break. The Spaniard, who admirably came through two rounds of qualifying against British opponents, had little to no answers to Raducanu\u2019s consistency. There would be no union jack hat-trick. <\/p>\n A double break soon followed with a forehand volley put-away, before the Brit closed it out with a sumptuous cross-court backhand passing shot. <\/p>\n A greater test lies ahead in round two on Thursday, in the form of Slovakia\u2019s world No 41 Rebecca Sramkova, who defeated defending Wimbledon<\/a> champion Barbora Krejcikova<\/a>. That will give the biggest indication of where Raducanu\u2019s game is on the grass and whether a seeding is tangible for Wimbledon<\/a>. <\/p>\n But on a positive day for the unseeded Brits as women\u2019s tennis returns to Queen\u2019s for the first time in 52 years<\/a> \u2013 Heather Watson joined Boulter and Sonay Kartal in round two \u2013 Raducanu made the firmest impression. Her road to Wimbledon<\/a> is off to a flyer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":173729,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4105],"tags":[79,1068,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-173728","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-sports","9":"tag-tennis","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114660744138813205","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173728","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=173728"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173728\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/173729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=173728"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=173728"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=173728"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Emma](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/GettyImages-2219494683.jpg\")
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Superior Speeds
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