Emma Raducanu said that she is not looking to hire a new permanent coach after signing a reported £2.6million sponsorship deal with Uniqlo.
The British No1 parted ways with Rafael Nadal’s former coach Francisco Roig after the Australian Open and has since been travelling with her hitting partner Alexis Canter.
Raducanu’s streak of hiring and firing coaches has inevitably made it trickier to find a replacement for Roig, but the 23-year-old insisted that she was content with her present set-up and wanted to continue focusing on returning to a “more aggressive style of playing” before the Indian Wells Open next week.
Raducanu said that “the rapport was great” with Roig, but that they did not align on aspects of her game
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“Right now I wouldn’t say I’m actively looking for a coach,” Raducanu told the Guardian in Japan. “I think I had a great experience with Francis in terms of how we got on so well — the rapport was great. I think in the end, we just weren’t aligning on certain key aspects. But we still maintain a really good relationship.
“Right now I have Alexis in my corner. He knows me as a person. He knows me as a player. And I’ve actually had some success with him in the past year in Washington [where Raducanu beat Naomi Osaka in the second round in July] and Cluj [where she reached the final at the start of February], so it’s going well.
“I know the drills that I need to be doing right now in this moment in time, just repetition of doing those key fundamentals. I think I want to go back to that and [develop] a more aggressive style of playing.”
Armed with a more aggressive style, Raducanu reached her first tour-level final since 2021 earlier this month
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Raducanu reached her first WTA Tour-level final since winning the US Open in 2021 in the Transylvania Open in Cluj-Napoca, Romania, earlier this month with Canter in her box, but a chest infection has hampered the world No25 since, forcing her to retire during her first-round match in Qatar before suffering a first-round defeat in Dubai.
“In Cluj I picked up a virus, I think, at the start of the tournament,” Raducanu said. “So I was dealing with that and the aftereffects. I had really long effects for the last three weeks. I’ve been trying to clear them. So the Middle East trip was very difficult for me.
“I’m getting ready for Indian Wells and just trying to get back to full health. And I still have a bit of time, so I’m just looking forward to doing my best to be ready for that.”
Raducanu has been associated with Nike since she was 15 years old — three years before she won the US Open — but a move to the Japanese clothing brand had been mooted since December. It teased the announcement with a social media post on Monday showing only a player’s arm holding a tennis racket with few distinguishing features.
The deal is an indication of Raducanu’s enduring commercial power, despite her inconsistent form and injury and fitness concerns. Uniqlo has previously only signed sponsorship deals with Roger Federer, who reportedly left Nike for a ten-year contract worth $300million (about £222million), Novak Djokovic and Japan’s Kei Nishikori.
Raducanu remains one of the most popular active players in the sport, with her 2.9 million Instagram followers second only to the world No1 Aryna Sabalenka — a more relevant figure to many brands than her world ranking.
Uniqlo teased tennis fans with this image of a player and the words: “We’re proud to welcome a new face to Uniqlo”
When the deal was confirmed on Tuesday a Uniqlo statement read: “Emma will champion Uniqlo’s LifeWear philosophy, which is committed to pursuing excellence, making meaningful contributions to society, and empowering the next generation.” Reports have also suggested that Raducanu will play a role in designing her own kit.
Raducanu’s other blue-chip sponsorship deals have included Evian, British Airways, HSBC, Porsche, Dior and Tiffany & Co. She earned just over £1million in prize money in 2025, but company filings showed that Raducanu’s income from commercial interests amounted to about four times that figure.
Raducanu’s departure from Nike reflects a shift in their strategy towards investing heavily in a more select number of marquee names. Carlos Alcaraz, Jannik Sinner and Sabalenka remain their key ambassadors, but the men’s British No1 Jack Draper switched to the Californian lifestyle brand Vuori last season.