{"id":284754,"date":"2025-07-23T08:35:09","date_gmt":"2025-07-23T08:35:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/284754\/"},"modified":"2025-07-23T08:35:09","modified_gmt":"2025-07-23T08:35:09","slug":"raducanus-us-open-buildup-gathers-pace-with-washington-win-over-kostyuk-tennis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/284754\/","title":{"rendered":"Raducanu\u2019s US Open buildup gathers pace with Washington win over Kostyuk | Tennis"},"content":{"rendered":"

Emma Raducanu began her buildup towards next month\u2019s US Open with an impressive straight-sets win over the seventh seed Marta Kostyuk at the DC Open in Washington.<\/p>\n

Playing her first singles match since stretching the world No 1 Aryna Sabalenka in the third round of Wimbledon<\/a>, Raducanu held off the Ukrainian world No 27 to pull through a gruelling encounter 7-6 (4), 6-4.<\/p>\n

Both players struggled on serve in a 71-minute opening set, trading early breaks before inevitably edging into a tie-break which Raducanu won despite initially sacrificing a 4-0 lead.<\/p>\n

The British No 3, who made a rare doubles appearance alongside Elena Rybakina earlier this week, looked the fresher of the pair in tough conditions and cemented her superiority by breaking en route to establishing a 3-0 lead in the second set.<\/p>\n

Kostyuk, who arrived in Washington having lost five singles matches in a row stretching back to May, rallied just when all seemed lost, breaking Raducanu back as she clawed back to parity at 4-4. Having forced Kostyuk to serve to stay in the match, the Ukrainian handed Raducanu two match points with a double fault, and the Briton seized her second chance to book her place in the second round.<\/p>\n

\u201cExtremely good win,\u201d Raducanu said in her on-court interview. \u201cPlaying Marta first round is extremely difficult and we\u2019ve always had some tough matches. I\u2019m happy with the way I fought through the first set and in the second, stayed tough when I needed to.\u201d<\/p>\n

Venus Williams celebrates her win over Peyton Stearns at the Citi Open. Photograph: Nick Wass\/AP<\/p>\n

Venus Williams became the oldest player to win a tour-level singles match for more than two decades when she beat fellow American Peyton Stearns<\/a>. In a match of 10 service breaks, the 45-year-old Williams, won 6-3, 6-4 to become the oldest winner since Martina Navratilova, who was 47 in 2004. It was her first singles victory since August 2023 and books a last-16 clash with Poland\u2019s Magdalena Frech, the fifth seed.<\/p>\n

The seven-time grand slam singles tournament winner returned to competitive action after 16 months out with a doubles victory alongside Hailey Baptiste on Monday. \u201cI think it was a big win for me today,\u201d she told the WTA website. \u201cIt won\u2019t be easy. It\u2019s not easy for anyone out here. So I know I\u2019ll have to fight for every match, but I\u2019m up for that.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are no limits for excellence. It\u2019s all about what\u2019s in your head and how much you\u2019re able to put into it. If you put in the work mentally, physically, and emotionally, then you can have the result.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cameron Norrie completed a notable win over the second seed and world No 7 Lorenzo Musetti to book his place in the last 16. Norrie, the world No 41, hit back from losing the opening set to triumph 3-6, 6-2, 6-3 and score his first win over a top 10-ranked player since reaching the quarter-finals at Indian Wells in 2023.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Emma Raducanu began her buildup towards next month\u2019s US Open with an impressive straight-sets win over the seventh…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":284755,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4105],"tags":[79,1068,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-284754","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\/114901635797193151","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284754","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=284754"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284754\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/284755"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=284754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=284754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=284754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}