Emma Raducanu on feeling ‘wary’, coaching change and Queen’s 2025
A group of ball girls giggle with excitement as they spot Raducanu hitting at Queen’s Club on Sunday.
She remains a huge draw to fans, sponsors and tournament organisers.
Multiple wrist and ankle operations and a series of other injuries derailed her attempts to build on that Grand Slam triumph in New York and frequent changes to her coaches also prompted questions around her set-up.
One coach, Vladimir Platenik, remained in her team for just a fortnight earlier this year.
However, she is starting this grass-court season with a more familiar and stable team, bringing back childhood coach Cavaday – who stepped aside for health reasons in January – to work alongside Mark Petchey, a former coach of Andy Murray.
“[In] the last couple months I found some better form but I’ve also learnt about myself that I can’t necessarily do it with people that I don’t trust, or I don’t necessarily like so, truthfully, for me that’s what’s improved as well in the last couple months,” she said.
“I have a pretty good gut feeling and intuition about people who I get on with, and who I trust.
“And I think sometimes I try and reason with myself because logically I’m like, ‘OK, well, maybe this person can bring me this and I need it’, and I try and force myself through it, but I’ve just realised, it doesn’t work.
“And when there’s a bad energy or bad environment, it just lingers.”
Raducanu reached the Miami Open quarter-finals and fourth round at the Italian Open since linking up with Petchey on a casual basis in March, but lost to Iga Swiatek in the second round of this month’s French Open.
Cavaday, who oversaw her rise back into the top 60 after she missed much of 2023 while recovering from surgeries, had been Raducanu’s sixth full-time coach of her professional career, following partnerships with Nigel Sears, Andrew Richardson, Torben Beltz, Dmitry Tursunov and Sebastian Sachs.
“I’m happy to see him healthy first of all, it has been a long time since we were last on court together in Australia,” Raducanu told a news conference when speaking about Cavaday.
“Mark is in Paris commentating [on the French Open], Nick was around and it was nice to have a few days with him. They’ll both be helping me throughout the grass [season]. I trust them both a lot.”