Emma Raducanu battled to victory over the American Peyton Stearns in the opening round of the Korea Open. A topsy-turvy contest featuring 12 breaks of serve went the way of the former US Open champion after two hours and 43 minutes as she wrapped up a 7-6 (4), 7-6 (5) win in Seoul.
It was Raducanu’s first victory since she beat the same player in Washington at the end of July, with the 21-year-old’s only tournament in August coming at the US Open, where she lost to Sofia Kenin in the opening round. Raducanu was emotional after that defeat and admitted she had made a mistake with her scheduling and wanted to play more matches.
She has committed to a relatively full schedule for the end of the season and made a positive start in Seoul, albeit with several hiccups along the way. She led 4-1 in the opening set and was 40-0 up on serve but lost four games in a row and then missed two set points trying to serve it out at 6-5 before taking it on a tie-break.
The second set went with serve until Raducanu broke to lead 5-3 but again she was shaky on her own delivery. Stearns, ranked 22 places higher at 48 in the world, reeled off three games only to drop her serve at the crucial moment.
That sent the set to another tie-break and this time Raducanu managed to make it across the line to set up a match with the Chinese eighth seed, Yuan Yue.
Raducanu said: “I’m proud to have made it through to the next round. It was very humid, the ball was bouncing around a lot. It was a tough match to get through.
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“I haven’t played many matches in the last few months and Peyton, she’s a really good player and on really good form.”
Source: theguardian.com
