US Open champion Emma Raducanu’s breakthrough season has ended with defeat in her opening match at the Upper Austria Ladies event in Linz.
Raducanu, 18, lost 6-1 6-7 (0-7) 7-5 to China’s Wang Xinyu before confirming Torben Beltz will be her new coach.
Wang, 20, played at a higher level than her world ranking of 106 as Raducanu, the top seed in the event, suffered a second straight defeat.
The British number one was hampered by injury near the end of a tight decider.
Having received a first-round bye in Linz, Raducanu had not played a match since losing 6-1 6-2 against Ukraine’s Marta Kostyuk in the Transylvanian Open on 29 October.
Since that defeat in Romania, she has also struggled with illness.
“Considering the last week I’ve had, I’m very proud of myself,” said Raducanu, who climbed into the world’s top 20 for the first time on Monday.
“I thought it was a really high level match.”
Work with Beltz set to start later this month
Beltz, a 44-year-old German who used to coach former world number one Angelique Kerber, is not in Austria with Raducanu this week.
He will start working with the teenager when she begins pre-season training at the end of the month.
Beltz has a strong pedigree, having coached Kerber when she won the Australian Open and US Open titles in 2016.
They reunited for this season but Kerber announced on Monday they would not be working together in 2022.
“It’s obviously a great privilege to be working with such an experienced coach – I’m definitely very excited to work with him throughout the pre-season and into next year,” said Raducanu.
“Things are looking up, it’s a very positive feeling and I’m excited about all the work that is to come.”
Raducanu has been without a coach since parting company with Andrew Richardson shortly after becoming the first qualifier to win the US Open in September.
She has been searching for someone with more experience of the WTA Tour, and Beltz certainly fits the bill, having worked for many years with Kerber as well as Croatia’s Donna Vekic.
“Obviously he has worked with Kerber, who is such a great player and won three Slams,” added Raducanu, who has played just five tour-level tournaments as well as Wimbledon and the US Open.
“I think that experience definitely helps with someone as inexperienced as me. He can help guide me through – which I feel really confident about.
“He’s also a really positive, cheerful guy who brings great energy to the team and I think that’s also important when you are travelling on the road for quite a long time on the tour.”
Raducanu ‘proud’ as stellar season comes to an end
Raducanu was unable to cope with qualifier Wang’s power and precision in a one-sided first set in Linz before settling down to turn the match into a contest.
The momentum swung away from the British number one again when she was injured with the third set still on serve and finely balanced.
Raducanu was broken for 5-4 and needed lengthy treatment on court before fighting off two match points to break back for 5-5.
But Raducanu lost serve again and, after requiring more treatment at the changeover, could not hold off a third match point as Wang closed out the biggest victory of her career to reach the quarter-finals.
“I thought Xinyu played extremely well, especially in that first set, and I’m proud of the way I fought to try to get back into the match,” Raducanu said.
“Everything was going her way and she was playing extremely well, so a lot of credit to her for keeping that level out there on the court.
“In the third set, I had a hip spasm in the first point of that game and from there I was just fighting to try to stay in it.”
