sport news Emma Raducanu is learning to play with 'a target on her back' trends now
Emma Raducanu will step out onto the grass next month having finally come full circle after the year which turned her life on its head.
Twelve months will have passed since she played the Viking Open in Nottingham, where she lost in the first round, before a few hundred people in virtual anonymity.
When the end came on Wednesday to this extraordinary first phase of her top line career it did so in the most deflating fashion, a deciding set running away from her.
Emma Raducanu crashed out of the French Open on Wednesday in a second round defeat
Raducanu was beaten by Aliaksandra Sasnovich of Belarus for the second time this year
On the French Open's Court Suzanne Lenglen – probably the most elegant stadium she has experienced, having still never set foot on Wimbledon's Centre Court – she went down 3-6, 6-1, 6-1 to Aliaksandra Sasnovich.
She will be outlasted at Roland Garros by compatriot Cam Norrie, who powered through to the third round with a straight sets win over Australia's Jason Kubler.
The defining moment of the last year was, of course, her winning the US Open. Since then Sasnovich has beaten her twice, and both times she has played with a fervour which supports what Raducanu's theory about what has been the abrupt change of all.
'It's different when you are someone who may have a target on their back,' she reflected.
Raducanu was competing in her first clay-court swing on the WTA Tour and is improving
'Everyone raises their game, wants to play well, wants to take you out. That's something I have definitely learned on the tour this year and I've accepted that.'
She is looking forward to returning to places that will now seem more familiar – she is not entered in Nottingham next month, but may decide to play after this relatively early exit from Paris.
'I do really welcome going around the second time. I think this year was always going to be challenging for me to adjust, find my feet. There's always something new, like I'm always asking where everything is.
'I feel like in the last 12 months I have definitely grown a lot. On the court I feel like I have probably improved how much I fight. I think that's one of my biggest strengths and
