2021 U.S. Open • From Qualifying To Queen Of Queens • Meet Tennis’ Newest Mega-Star: Emma Raducanu

By 10sBalls.com Staff

The newest mega-star of the biggest women’s sport in the world was crowned on a historic Saturday in New York City as British teenager Emma Raducanu announced herself to the world as the 2021 U.S. Open Champion. The 18 year-old who burst onto the world scene from nowhere with a fourth-round run at her home Major at Wimbledon earlier this summer capped off her meteoric rise to stardom with her 20th straight set won this tournament to defeat another young breakout star Leylah Fernandez 6-4, 6-3. 

Coming through the qualifying, Raducanu made history as the first qualifier in the open-era to win a Grand Slam marking three weeks of tennis, ten match wins, and not a single set lost along the way for one of the great achievements in this sport’s history. This youthful women’s final made history of its own with the first major championship between two unseeded players and the first all-teenage affair with Fernandez, 19, since the 1999 U.S. Open. 

Raducanu, who’s parents are of Romanian and Chinese ancestry and is the youngest Grand Slam champion since 17 year-old Maria Sharapova took the world by storm winning Wimbledon in 2004. That will surely not be the only similarity Raducanu faces with the five-time major winner, mega-star, and global icon. Raducanu’s youthful energy, refreshing and charming personality, quiet and cool confidence, and overall effortlessness and chill makes her next in line to be one of the faces of the sport to the world and an overnight sensation in her native Great Britain, Wimbledon snd the nation are thirsting for a great women’s champion. 

While she didn’t drop a set the entire tournament, Raducanu’s 6-4, 6-3 scoreline will be a bit deceiving as to just how close it was. Fernandez, who celebrated her 19th birthday this tournament and became the star of the US Open with her back-to-back-to-back-to-back wins over top seeds Naomi Osaka, Angelique Kebrer, Elina Svitolina, and Aryna Sabalenka, pushed Raducanu with her never-ceasing fighting spirit and tricky lefty strokes and angles, providing a highly compelling and competitive straight sets match, one leaving the New York crowd enthralled inside Arthur Ashe Stadium on a glorious Saturday evening. 

What makes Raducanu’s remarkable win all the more incredible though was just how easy she made it look and how unphased by it all she was. With beautiful and brilliant technique and a strong mental game, Raducanu didn’t ever seem to be playing outside herself and redlining her game. What’s so impressive about it is just how easy and repeatable it all looks. Who’s to say she can’t go win the next major Down Under in Australia? Emma Raducanu isn’t going away anytime soon. She’s just arrived as the biggest new star in tennis. And that’s good for the sport.