Emma Raducanu admits she was overpowered by Amanda Anisimova at Indian Wells
By Press Association Sport Staff
Emma Raducanu admitted she could not summon the power to compete with Amanda Anisimova after crashing to a 52-minute defeat in the third round at Indian Wells.
The Briton was overwhelmed in a 6-1 6-1 thrashing, broken in the first game and consistently rattled by Anisimova’s strength. She repeatedly declined to chase down drop shots and struggled to put her opponent under any pressure with her return of serve.
The manner of the defeat to the sixth seed sapped some of the optimism generated by Raducanu’s fluent 6-1 6-3 win over Anastasia Zakharova and leaves plenty of questions still to answer as she bids to rebuild her style.
The 23-year-old’s first serve misfired badly and she hit just two winners to her opponent’s 21.
The 2021 US Open winner cut ties with her latest coach Francisco Roig in January and has been working on an ad-hoc basis with Mark Petchey in a bid to relocate her best form.
Reflecting on defeat in California, she said: “I need to obviously be aggressive when playing those players, but I think there’s still a long way to go to be doing that and I need to use my strengths and probably mix it up a bit more.
“When I’m playing someone who’s at the top like that, I think they have an extra 10 miles an hour on their serve than me. If I’m not feeling it, that gap feels more evident in terms of weight of shot, in terms of power.
“You just feel a little bit behind and your punches aren’t landing as much as theirs are.”
Taking charge 👊
No-nonsense from @AnisimovaAmanda, as she takes the first set against Raducanu 6-1.#TennisParadise pic.twitter.com/HVz8FcbgHq— wta (@WTA) March 8, 2026
The 23-year-old is trying to take the positives from her experience, adding: “I have to look at what I achieved in the last nine days of practice since I arrived here, and the first match was a good one for me.
“Today I could let it get me down if I wanted to, but overall I think the days have been better than not.”
Top seed Aryna Sabalenka eased into the last 16 with a 6-4 6-1 win over Romania’s Jaqueline Cristian.
She will meet Naomi Osaka, who needed all three sets to get past Camila Osorio of Colombia 6-1 3-6 6-1, while fourth seed Coco Gauff retired due to injury when trailing Alex Eala 2-6 0-2.
“It felt like a firework was going off inside of my arm and then my whole arm felt like it was on fire,” Gauff said.
In the men’s draw, second seed Jannik Sinner needed just 71 minutes to book his place in the last 16 with a 6-3 6-2 win over Canada’s Denis Shapovalov.
Fourth seed Alexander Zverev was made to work harder before beating Brandon Nakashima 7-6 5-7 6-4 in just over two and a half hours.
