Emma Raducanu fights back from verge of fainting but Miami Open run ends

Emma Raducanu’s resurgent run to the Miami Open quarter-finals came to an end on Wednesday with a dramatic three-set defeat by Jessica Pegula, during which she had her blood pressure and pulse checked by a doctor because of dizziness.

The 22-year-old Briton battled hard and showed once again the quality ball-striking that has been such a key part of her improved performances at this prestigious WTA 1,000 tournament in Florida. It was still not enough, though, to get the better of a high-class opponent in Pegula, with the American world No4 prevailing 6-4, 6-7 (3-7), 6-2 in two hours and 25 minutes.

There were concerns for Raducanu in the second set when she suddenly looked as if she was on the verge of fainting. A doctor was called to the court and checked Raducanu’s vital signs before applying ice to various parts of her body.

Remarkably, Raducanu managed to win the set in a tie-break but her fitness was no match for Pegula in the decider. Afterwards she cited various factors for her physical struggles, including a long delay to the start of the match. The three-match day schedule did not finish until 8.30pm, forcing a 9pm start for Raducanu and Pegula’s contest in the opening slot of a night session originally scheduled to commence at 7pm.

Raducanu described her struggles with the humid conditions after the match SMG/REX/SHUTTERSTOCK

“I just felt really dizzy,” Raducanu told TennisOne. “I felt faint. It was very humid out there and we had a long wait, so maybe it was just an accumulation. [There were] just physical points as well, with long rallies and heavy conditions. I don’t know how I kind of regrouped in that second set but in the third I definitely struggled a little bit.”

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Despite the defeat this has been a very encouraging tournament for Raducanu after a long search for form in the first three months of this season. Four consecutive wins have been claimed at a WTA event for the first time since her triumph at the 2021 US Open and she is now guaranteed a return to the world’s top 50 at a projected ranking of No48.

Raducanu also claimed her first top-ten victory on a hard court by beating Emma Navarro, the world No10 from the United States, in the second round, but Pegula was a step up in opposition. Although the 31-year-old has never won a grand-slam title, she is one of the most consistent performers year-round on the tour and excels on this surface.

It should motivate Raducanu, then, that she was able to go toe to toe with Pegula for much of the first two sets. Pegula’s serve proved the difference in the first set as she did not face a single break point, before Raducanu put some extra power behind her ground strokes in the second set to level the match.

This is Pegula’s third run to the semi-finals in Miami in the past four years GEOFF BURKE/IMAGN IMAGES

While Pegula raced away with the third set after a break of serve for 2-0, Raducanu should not be at all disheartened by the finish considering her dizziness. Over the coming days it is something to reflect on with her fitness trainer Yutaka Nakamura as she prepares for the transition to clay, on which her first scheduled tournament is Great Britain’s Billie Jean King Cup qualifier in the Netherlands on April 11-12.

“I think I need to just take a break and kind of re-evaluate what I’m doing,” Raducanu said. “This week was good but I need to just figure things out and then I’ll make a plan from there.”

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Controversy followed the end of Raducanu’s match at 11.25pm when spectators were told that the next scheduled contest, between Novak Djokovic and Sebastian Korda in the last 16 of the men’s draw, had been cancelled.

Boos rang out from the stands when the tournament MC explained that rules introduced on the tour last year prevented the match starting after 11pm, and that it had been rescheduled for the following day. Reduced tickets of $10 (about £8) were offered for anyone who wished to return for the entire three-match session.

This was frankly a situation that should have been avoided by organisers. Rain on Tuesday had bizarrely led them to decide that the scheduled last-16 match between Arthur Fils and Alexander Zverev be put back a day and squeezed in alongside two other matches on the main stadium court. A start of 1pm for this session was asking for trouble and so it proved when two of the three matches went to three sets.

Pegula, meanwhile, returns in Thursday’s night session for her semi-final against an unheralded teenager who has produced the best breakout run of this year so far. Alexandra Eala, a 19-year-old from the Philippines, was ranked No140 in the world when she arrived in Miami to take up a wild card for the main draw and has since consecutively beaten three grand-slam champions — Jelena Ostapenko, Madison Keys and Iga Swiatek — to reach the last four and guarantee entry to the top 100 at a projected ranking of No75.

Eala graduated from the Rafa Nadal Tennis Academy in 2023, with the man himself and her quarter-final opponent Swiatek in attendance THE TENNIS LETTER/X

Already Eala is breaking new territory for her nation in tennis. In 2022 she became the first Filipina to win a junior grand-slam singles title at the US Open and now she is the first to go so deep in a WTA tournament. It is a deserved reward for her decision to leave home at the age of 13 for the Rafa Nadal Academy in Mallorca, Spain, and she noticeably had the support of Toni Nadal, Rafa’s uncle and former coach, in her box during her 6-2, 7-5 victory against Swiatek on Wednesday.

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