John McEnroe has risked reopening his row with Emma Raducanu by telling her to ‘learn her lessons and back up the hype.’
Raducanu shot to fame after winning the US Open as a qualifier last year, although she has struggled to assert herself on the WTA Tour since.
She made a breakthrough at Wimbledon 12 months ago, where she reached the fourth round as a total unknown.
However, she was unable to repeat that this season and crashed out in the second round against Caroline Garcia.
Last year, McEnroe criticised Raducanu for failing to deal with the pressure, and he was similarly scathing this time too – perhaps even more so.
“Nerves play a part here, but she’s 19 years old. I mean, she should be you know, be able to deal with that very quickly,” McEnroe said while speaking to the BBC on their Wimbledon highlights show.
“I suspect and I hope that some big things will happen in the future, but you got to start believing, you know, back up the hype.
“She needs to get in her comfort zone with whoever the people are around her. I don’t know who they are because she keeps switching teams as new coaches come in and out of the situation. That’s not a good thing.
“But she’s got to figure it out and let’s not forget, she won the US Open. Some slouch doesn’t win the US Open. She’s a great player. You got to look at it like that.”
Emma Raducanu came into Wimbledon with minimal grass preparation after sustaining a muscular injury at Nottingham.
McEnroe, though, believes it is time for her to stop making excuses and start to embrace the expectation.
“I’m not buying this idea that she doesn’t have experience [on grass],” he said. “She got to the fourth round at Wimbledon last year.
“She’s had injuries okay, I get it. You got to obviously you want to be healthy, but hopefully she’ll realise that a lot is expected and I’m sure she expects a lot from herself. She could do some big things.
“She won the US Open, I’m gonna say it again – she won the US Open. But of course there’s a lot of expectations coming from that.”
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