Who is 18-year-old US Open tennis player Emma Radocano? : NPR

Emma Radokano’s career is booming.

At just 18 years old, she accomplished a feat on Saturday that very few could have expected, winning the US Open title. Representing the United Kingdom, Raducanu beat 19-year-old Canadian Leila Fernandez to win 6-4, 6-3, in a final that was already an anomaly as it was the first time he had been exclusively a teenager squared in the final In more than 20 years.

Raducanu’s performance at the US Open had already made history even before her victory: She competed as a qualifier, and was the first men’s or women’s tennis qualifier to even make it to the finals of a Grand Slam tournament, according to the CNN.

Although Raducanu holds dual citizenship in Canada and the United Kingdom, her huge win is a big deal for Britain in particular; She is the first British player to win a Grand Slam tournament in 44 years. The most recent was Virginia Wade, who won Wimbledon in 1977.

Raducanu’s victory led to praise from the Queen, who congratulated the teenager in public speech He called her win a “fantastic achievement” and praised her “hard work and dedication”.

A profession that has been in the making for decades

Raducanu was born in Toronto, Canada but moved to London when she was two years old, according to the WTA Tour Curriculum Vitae. She has been playing tennis since she was five years old. Her father is Romanian and her mother is Chinese. They both work in finance, and she credits them with teaching her to be disciplined, according to South China Morning Newspaper.

“I think it definitely helped me, the mentality they both bring,” Radocano said in July. And they both come from hard-working countries.”

During the 2018 Wimbledon Juniors, she made it to the girls’ quarter-finals, according to Women Tennis Association.

She started her career in 2018 and had just competed in it First Grand Slam event In June with Wimbledon. She finally had it pull out During the fourth round due to breathing problems, however, by reaching the third round, she became the youngest British woman to reach this far since 2002, according to BBC Sports. Prior to that, she had taken more than a year off due to the pandemic and completed high school, according to the Women’s Tennis Association. Mail.

A large list of achievements under her belt

Raducanu’s rise to fame was astonishing: she entered the US Open ranked 150th in the world but Leaving it at number 23. She broke a string of records in the process: She is the youngest player to win a Grand Slam singles tournament since 2004, defeating Maria Sharapova, who won Wimbledon in 2004 at the age of 17. She is also the first player to earn a title on her second Grand Slam appearance, the Women’s Tennis Association reports.

With her victory in the US Open (in which she managed to win every combination), earned her status as a rising star in the tennis world, plus she’s gotten $2.5 million richer. And she said, as she said, that she also fulfilled a lifelong dream Reuters.

“It’s an absolute dream,” she said. “I’ve always dreamed of winning a Grand Slam. You just say these things. You say, ‘I want to win one of the Grand Slams.’ But to have a belief, and actually do, to win a Grand Slam, I can’t believe it.”