Wimbledon: What’s brewing between Emma Raducanu and Carlos Alacaraz?

Love seems to be in the air as Wimbledon gets underway with usual fanfare at the All England Tennis Club on Monday, 30 June. The buzz is Carlos Alcaraz, the defending champion and the man who would be king in men’s tennis, is dating British player Emma Raducanu.

A former US Open champion, 22-year-old Raducanu has been linked with Alcaraz for  some time now and speculations got rife when the former was spotted cheering for Alcaraz during the men’s singles semi-final at HSBC Championships recently in west London. ‘’We’re just good friends,’’ Raducanu quipped during the pre tournament press conference at Wimbledon – which saw the moderator interrupting to end the media conference with the Briton in splits.

“Way to wrap up!” said Raducanu, who became a darling of the media and the endorsement sector after being a surprise winner of the US Open in 2021 before dropping down the pecking order for last few years. Scheduled to face wildcard entry Mimi Xu of Britain in the women’s singles first round, Raducanu was also pictured practising with Alcaraz on Friday. “It was fun yesterday. We were both on court with (water brand) Evian,” she said.

Looking beyond Wimbledon, Raducanu will be pairing up with Alcaraz in the US Open mixed doubles in August. In a departure from the past, the US Open mixed doubles will be a standalone tournament for the first time ever on 19-20 August before the main tournament starts on August 24. The idea to make the mixed doubles event at US Open a standalone one was to attract more singles players, who generally skips the doubles events.

“I’m super excited about it. I think it’s going to be great. It was an amazing idea for the tournament. We will try to win. But obviously it’s going to be really, really fun,’’ Alcaraz had said while speaking about the mixed doubles campaign.