Emma Raducanu believes her new coaching partnership with Francisco Roig can help to take her game to the next level as she tries to continue her recent rise up the rankings.
“First impressions are it’s going really well,” Raducanu said, speaking for the first time on the move in an interview with the Guardian. “We did a few days after Wimbledon together and I was really happy with how it went. I’m just so excited to have him on board, so much experience. I’m really looking forward to continuing.”
By hiring Roig, Raducanu has added a wealth of experience to her team. A former player with a career-high singles ranking of No 60 in 1992, Roig came to prominence as a longtime member of Rafael Nadal’s coaching team, working alongside Toni Nadal, Rafael’s uncle and coach, as the Spaniard built one of the great careers. Roig decided to end his 18-year partnership with Nadal in 2022 and he later briefly coached the injury-prone Italian Matteo Berrettini.
Although Raducanu’s numerous coaching changes have been a big narrative in her career, this appointment comes at a different point in her development. Raducanu has put together a consistent run of quality tennis over the past few months; she is clearly playing with confidence on the court and appears to be in a more positive place away from the court. Raducanu had been working on an ad hoc basis with Mark Petchey since March but Petchey, who is also a broadcaster, could not commit to working with her on a day-to-day basis. The pair remain in close contact.
Now at No 33 in the WTA rankings and 25 in the WTA race, a positive result in Cincinnati would lead to her being seeded at a grand slam tournament for the first time since her US Open points fell off. Raducanu, seeded 30th, has received a first-round bye and faces a qualifier or lucky loser in Cincinnati.
After a brief trial period following her run to the third round at Wimbledon this year, Raducanu opted to work with Roig and they have agreed a contract until the end of the year. She is hopeful that he can help her to take another step forward: “I think I can definitely improve on a lot of my shots, just the quality of them,” Raducanu said.
“I think I’ve been good at being creative, scrapping, playing the big points well, but I think the overall quality of my game needs to be better. And I see that when I play the really top players where I can’t run and scrap, wait on them to miss. I think that’s where I need to improve. And yeah, I’m hoping he can help me with that.”
Raducanu and Roig began their partnership with a long day of training on Tuesday, following up her morning sparring session with Rebecca Sramkova of Slovakia with an evening training session on a remote court with only Roig. There was plenty of laughter alongside their high-intensity work. Raducanu then pushed back her media duties by an hour on Wednesday to spend extra time on the practice court and then she finished her day with another session.
Such is the nature of professional tennis, where players and their team members spend a significant period of time together while travelling on the tour, another challenge for Raducanu and Roig will be to connect on a personal level. The vast Ohio roads may prove to be an icebreaker between them. At Cincinnati, the seeded players are given cars to drive to and from the tournament venue. “I actually drove from the airport,” Raducanu said.
“I didn’t know I had a car, so I landed, and they were like: ‘Oh, you have a car,’ and it’s this massive Cadillac Escalade. So I’m like, ‘this is like a bus’. Obviously in England, we’re used to driving small cars, small roads, so I was a bit tight. Wrong side of the road as well. But it’s OK. I managed to get to the hotel.
Since then, Raducanu has handed over driving responsibilities to Roig. As with his coaching capabilities, her first impressions of his driving skills are positive: “So far so good,” she said, smiling. “It’s been tested too, in the dark, in the rain, in the sun. It’s fine.”
