Emma Raducanu will make her return to tennis in the United Cup team competition in Australia in the first week of 2027. The 2021 US Open champion has not played since June because of a stress fracture of the shin.
Raducanu lost to Croatia’s Donna Vekic in her first grass-court final at Queen’s Club on 14 June. Just 14 days later, she pulled out of Wimbledon on the eve of her opening match.
The 23-year-old considered playing a couple of events in Asia this autumn. Instead, she has delayed her return until January, which allows her to use a special ranking of 38 to enter tournaments.
Special ranking opens doors
A special ranking is available to players who have been out with injury for at least six months. In Raducanu’s case, it reflects her position in the world rankings after Wimbledon, because she received some prize money despite not playing a match there.
The current British number five can use the special ranking to enter eight events next year, including two Grand Slams and five WTA 1000 tournaments. Her actual ranking of 107 would likely be too low to make the main draw of the Australian Open in January or most other WTA Tour events.
With the special ranking, Raducanu will not only be assured of a place in Melbourne. She will also be able to compete at the WTA 1000 events in Doha, Dubai, Indian Wells and Miami, which follow in February and March.
The United Cup entry deadline passed on Monday, shortly after Raducanu’s application for a special ranking was approved. That ranking of 38 makes her the British number one for the purposes of the event. She will play alongside Arthur Fery in a competition featuring 18 national teams.
Francesca Jones, Jan Choinski, and doubles players Neal Skupski and Olivia Nicholls complete the British squad. The tournament runs from 1 to 10 January. Britain will face Australia and France in their group matches in Sydney, and Raducanu can expect to meet top-40 players Talia Gibson and Diane Parry.
Long layoff raises questions
Raducanu made a gradual return to training in early September. Four months is a long time to train without competitive action, and she may not play any exhibitions before the end of the year. A spell of warm-weather training is expected, with the Middle East a popular destination for players preparing for the Australian Open.
Recent practice sessions in London with head coach Andrew Richardson and LTA national coach Alex Ward have grown more intense, according to observers. Even so, by the time Raducanu returns, she will have been out for more than six months. Playing a few tournaments in Asia could have helped her regain match sharpness and allowed a faster start to 2027.
Her fellow Briton Sonay Kartal offers a useful comparison. Kartal has enjoyed considerable success since returning from six months out with a stress fracture of the back in September. In her first WTA Tour event back, she reached the third round of the China Open. She then beat world number six Elina Svitolina and world number 12 Belinda Bencic on her way to the Wuhan Open final.
Kartal said there were a “lot of conversations” about where she should make her return.
“I think I wanted to just go straight in. I trusted that I would be able to get my level back, I just didn’t know how quickly,” the 25-year-old said.
“But I still think there is a long way to go. I can produce the level, but can I sustain it? Rehab is draining, and the body is not used to a lot of matches on the tour, so I do feel the aches and the pains from that.”
A career hampered by time out
Raducanu turns 24 later this week, and there is no escaping the amount of time she has missed since her stunning New York victory as a teenage qualifier. She has averaged just 31 matches a season in the five years since that triumph. Players aiming for the world’s top 20 would hope to play around twice that number.
Elena Rybakina, for example, played 68 matches across 20 tournaments this year as she rose to the top of the world rankings for the first time. Raducanu played just 21 matches this year, losing in the second round of the Australian Open and the first round at Roland Garros.
The picture was brighter in 2025. Raducanu contested a career-best 50 matches that year. Earlier this year, she climbed to 23 in the rankings shortly after reaching the final in the Romanian city of Cluj.
Her early preparation was affected by bone bruising in her foot. She also did not play for two months between March and May because of a post-viral illness picked up in Cluj.
Raducanu said a stress fracture of the shin was confirmed only after a final scan on the night before Wimbledon. In her desperation to play, she had continued to train at times in the run-up to the championships, even though medical advice had suggested that might be unwise.