Emma Raducanu hopes to rediscover ‘natural’ style that has been ‘coached out of me’
Emma Raducanu says she is determined to wrest back control of her “natural” tennis style, with the British No 1 eager not to be bound by the diktats of a single coach.“I want to come back to my natural way of playing.That takes time to relearn because that’s something that has been coached out of me a little bit,” Raducanu told BBC Sport.“I have had a lot of people telling me what to do, how to play, and it hasn’t necessarily fit.I don’t necessarily want to have one coach in the role because anyone I bring in is straight away going to be scrutinised – even if it’s a trial.
“I might feel the pressure to stick with them, even if it’s not necessarily the right decision,I would love to have a coach that works well, but I don’t think it’s necessarily going to be easy to find one person and they are going to check every box,Raducanu is back in action this week at the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells, where a good run could lift her from her world ranking of 24th,It has been another turbulent start to a season for the 23-year-old, who went into the Australian Open underprepared because of a foot injury, parted ways with another coach in Francisco Roig, reached her first final since the US Open in Romania and then struggled with illness,The split with Roig followed a second-round Australian Open defeat by Anastasia Potapova that saw Raducanu voice her unhappiness with the way she was playing under the Spaniard.
She will be helped again in California by Mark Petchey, who served as an ad hoc coach for several months during the spring and summer last season, while her hitting partner, Alexis Canter, is providing day-to-day support.Yet the former US Open champion is not ruling out hiring another full-time coach.“I definitely have my mind open to it,” she said.“It’s just that I would rather someone not come in and tell me ‘let’s do this’, and I disagree with it but have to listen to them.So far Alexis has been really good, but I am definitely going to tap into a few people here and there.
”While much of the focus is again on Raducanu’s coaching strategy, her compatriot and former world No 4 Tim Henman believes work in the gym and on the practice court should be the priority.“It’s still too stop-start,” he said.“She has to become physically more resilient to be stronger and faster to then compete with the biggest hitters and the best players.“I understand the way she wants to play.She’s an attacking baseline player.
If I could add one element to her game, it would only be on the physical side – to get stronger, faster, to hit the ball harder,“You look at the physicality of a [Aryna] Sabalenka, a [Iga] Swiatek, a Coco Gauff, a [Elena] Rybakina, Emma’s not at that level,And to a certain extent, with her physique, she might not ever be at that level but she’s got to close the gap,She’s [24] in the world but I think there’s a lot of us that believe she can be a lot better,”
Badenoch gives a borderline disgraceful performance at PMQs on Iran | John Crace
On another day it might even have been quite funny. The mismatch between Kemi Badenoch’s self-belief and her performance. But Wednesday’s prime minister’s questions was far too serious for that, with Donald Trump’s Awfully Big Iranian Adventure threatening to escalate into all-out war in the Middle East.It was also a day when you could think the unthinkable. Might Kemi actually be even weaker than Chris Philp? Certainly she’s the worst leader of the Tory party in living memory
‘He’s no Winston Churchill’: why Starmer can shrug off Trump’s insults over Iran
It was perhaps the most attention-grabbing moment of prime minister’s questions. Responding to yet another Conservative salvo about his approach to Iran and how it might affect ties with America, Keir Starmer was direct.“American planes are operating out of British bases – that is the special relationship in action,” he said. “Sharing intelligence every day to keep our people safe – that is the special relationship in action. Hanging on to President Trump’s latest words is not the special relationship in action
Andy Burnham criticises ‘bankruptcy’ of Labour approach to campaigning
Andy Burnham has reignited hostilities with Keir Starmer’s Labour leadership, criticising what he described as the “bankruptcy” of the party’s approach to campaigning, a week after it lost the previously safe seat of Gorton and Denton.The mayor of Greater Manchester and former MP, regarded as a rival to Starmer, said Labour’s campaigning style prevented it from connecting with non-Labour voters and other progressive parties, as he evoked the system of clipboard-wielding canvassers going door to door with records of previous Labour supporters.“What I want to say today is that the time has most definitely come for a serious conversation about our political system and its pervading culture, particularly so in the aftermath of the Gorton and Denton byelection,” Burnham said in a speech at the British Library in London that reignited speculation he has not given up on replacing Starmer.“It revealed the full depth of the chasm between people and Westminster politics. I don’t think anybody can seriously dispute that statement
Labour MP says she had no reason to suspect her husband may have broken law after his arrest on suspicion of spying for China – as it happened
One of the three men arrested on suspicion of spying for China is David Taylor, the husband of a Labour MP.Joani Reid, MP for East Kilbride and Strathaven, told Sky News in a statement:double quotation markI have never seen anything to make me suspect my husband has broken any law.I am not part of my husband’s business activities, and neither I nor my children are part of this investigation, and we should not be treated by media organisations as though we are.Above all I expect media organisations to respect my children’s privacy.That’s all from me, Tom Ambrose, and indeed the UK politics live blog for today
Ex-Nato commander defends Starmer after Trump’s ‘no Winston Churchill’ jibe
Britain cannot become embroiled in a war “without a clear end point”, a former senior Nato commander has said, as he defended Keir Starmer after Donald Trump’s jibes that he was “not Winston Churchill”.Trump was “another American president who had launched a war of choice,” said Gen Sir Richard Shirreff, as a minister insisted that the UK prime minister had acted “with a cool head” by not allowing British bases to be used for initial strikes.The US president launched a deeply personal attack on Starmer over his refusal to let Washington launch initial strikes on Iran from British bases, telling reporters on Tuesday in the White House: “This is not Winston Churchill that we’re dealing with.”In his latest extraordinary salvo, Trump said he was not happy with the UK even though Starmer eventually agreed the US could use the Diego Garcia military base in the Chagos Islands for strikes on Iranian missile facilities.Asked in a series of interviews on Wednesday morning about Trump’s comments, the chief secretary to the Treasury, James Murray, said: “The prime minister took the decision he did in the national interest
MPs say Starmer’s UK-EU reset lacks ‘direction, definition and drive’
Keir Starmer’s efforts to reset the UK’s relationship with the EU are lacking in “direction, definition and drive”, parliament’s foreign affairs committee has said.A report based on months of expert witness testimony found the summit between the UK and the EU at Lancaster House last May had “substantially improved the overall political relationship” after years of Brussels-bashing by the Conservatives.But it concluded the UK “lacks clear strategic priorities”, which in turn results in “the appearance that the EU has achieved more concrete progress towards their most pressing demands than the UK”.Emily Thornberry, Labour MP and chair of the committee, said: “Sadly, we found that despite progress in some areas, the government’s reset is languishing, suffering from a lack of direction, definition and drive. It feels as though we are on a journey with no clear destination
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