British tennis player Emma Raducanu gets an unexpected entry to the Abu Dhabi Open first round after a last-minute upgrade.
According to Tennis365, Raducanu, who was all set to play her first qualifying event since her 2021 US Open win, got a surprise upgrade to the first round after organisers upgraded her qualifying wildcard to a main draw wildcard.
The world No. 56 got a qualifying wildcard for the WTA 500 event in the United Arab Emirates as she was unable to qualify for the direct entry into the main draw due to her ranking.
Just hours before the scheduled revealing of her first-round opponent's name, her wildcard was upgraded. Now she joined the 2020 Olympic champion and former UAE champion Belinda Bencic, 2023 Wimbledon winner Marketa Vondrousova, former world No. 4 Caroline Garcia, and Ashlyn Krueger as the players who received wildcards.
After losing to Cristina Bucsa in the Singapore Tennis Open 2025 first round, the 22-year-old expressed, “To be honest, I don’t know what’s next for me. I feel like a lot of things kind of changed in the last week. So I think I just need to regroup and get some advice on what (events) I should play next, but I’m ready to go pretty much straight away. I’m ready to keep building.”
“I just have to take that positive (from the match) and, when I look at it practically, realistically, and unemotionally, I think, ‘Okay, my level is improving.’ I’m not actually sure what I’m going to do from here. It kind of depends on what I play. I love Singapore, though, as a place. It’s a shame I can’t stay here longer. It is what it is."
Notably, the Abu Dhabi Open will be Raducanu’s third tournament of the 2025 season after the Australian Open and Singapore Tennis Open.
