Emma Raducanu is currently having a difficult tennis season plagued by injury. Today, she withdrew from the Madrid Open hours before her first-round match due to a right-hand injury, meaning the British No 1 and 2021 US Open champion will now drop out of the Women’s Tennis Association top 100 in the world.
It’s the kind of news that causes someone to trend in the top 10 search terms on Google, as Emma has done today - but click into the searches related to Emma’s name and you’ll notice something even more troubling than her recent losses. ‘Emma Raducanu sexy’ is the seventh most searched term, up 300% in volume, while ‘Emma Raducanu hot’ trails closely behind at the ninth most searched item.
Perhaps this is information we never needed to know, nor do we wish to – but it exists, and it’s extremely telling about the way in which the world views, and reacts, to young female athletes once they explode into fame.
Not only has Raducanu barely escaped her teen years, turning 20 in November last year, but she’s done everything in her power to distance herself from any kind of sexualised image. She doesn’t have to, nor are we suggesting it’s necessarily intentional, but she does it anyway. Her Instagram is full of wholesome pictures training or pursuing other hobbies with friends and family. In the press, she sticks to tennis chat, rarely offering glimpses into her private life and certainly not her romantic life. It seems clear she’s uncomfortable giving too much away, or publicly showing herself participating in the most natural parts of adolescence like partying or dating. To put it frankly, she’d be the ideal Disney star.
Now, none of this is to suggest that those who do post less wholesome content or talk about their private life deserve to be sexualised, but it is to say that Emma has clearly gone out of her way to maintain a particularly wholesome image, and yet she’s still falling victim to the same foul objectification as all women are on the public stage. In fact, it begs the question, why even bother trying to be as some would call ‘brand safe’, when sleazy Google searchers will seek out ‘sexy’ pictures of you anyway?
This is a young woman who only wants to be the best at tennis, to carve out a legacy like incredible women before her have done so. She wants to be known for her athletic ability, an inspiration to young girls like her who hope to achieve such competitive excellence. Would a young male tennis star who demonstrates such commitment to the sport ever be sexualised in this way? We would argue not.
It's a particular issue for female athletes, many of whom are subject to endless commentary about their figures or tiny uniforms (that they literally have no control over wearing) in tabloid headlines as much as on social media. We see it every year during major tournaments - women's unbelievable athletic achievements diminished by discourse around their bodies.
Frankly, the existence of the Emma Raducanu searches teaches us a lesson: there’s nothing female athletes can do without being subject to sexism - and they deserve better.