John McEnroe believes the pressure of winning one of the grand slams is proving too much to bear for Emma Raducanu at the moment. The British number one crashed out of the French Open with a 6-3, 1-6, 1-6 defeat to Aliaksandra Sasnovich.
The defeat marked the teen’s second successive exit from a major at the second round, a far cry from her historic run to the US Open title last September. This prompted McEnroe to suggest that the Bromley local is struggling with the added attention on her since joining the sport’s elite group of Grand Slam winners so early in her career.
McEnroe told Eurosport : “We have got to keep a little perspective here. At Wimbledon last year she was unable to finish a match because of stress and it got to be too much for her. Then she came out and did something that no one has ever done – man or woman – in 150 years of tennis, coming from the qualifying and winning. All of a sudden, there is this pressure on her, this expectation, that has gotten a little bit overwhelming as well.”
