Wimbledon teen star Emma Raducanu set for breakthrough off the court
- British teenager’s background opens up possibility of Chinese market like Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics poster girl Eileen Gu
- Japan’s Naomi Osaka has ripped up the rule book when it comes to earning power of female athletes
Being more accurate, Raducanu has captured the hearts of more than one nation. The Briton of Romanian and Chinese parents was the subject of much media and social media interest in her mother’s homeland and no doubt there was added interest in Romania when she beat top player Sorana Cirstea in the third round.
Canada-born, London-raised Raducanu is in touch enough with all these aspects of her background to list them in her social media bio: “Toronto London Bucharest Shenyang” and she regularly visited both Romania and China, at least before Covid-19.
Raducanu walked away from Wimbledon with US$250,000 for reaching the fourth round and whatever follows from her on-court winnings – and the view in tennis is that she is the real deal – there is much more to come off the court, if she wants it.
Emma Raducanu wins Wimbledon Breakthrough Award
Her Instagram has shot past 380,000 followers and there are another 137,500 on Twitter, numbers which add up to her being a very marketable young athlete and one, with her Chinese heritage and ability to speak Mandarin, that could readily break into the Chinese market.
All of this and her promising talent on court means that Raducanu has a chance of superstardom that many other athletes simply do not.
Take Naomi Osaka. The Japanese-Haitian-American is to be the face of the Tokyo Olympic Games and has been mentioned as the nation’s flag-bearer.
Osaka was born in Japan, her mother’s homeland, and raised in the US. She represents Japan internationally but her renown goes well beyond either of those countries.
Last year, former world No 1 Osaka won her second US Open, her third slam overall, and was named among the 2020 Sportspersons of the Year by Sports Illustrated and Time’s 100 most influential people in the world for the second year running.
This year she won the Australian Open, as well as the 2021 Laureus World Sportswoman of the Year, the ESPY for Female Athlete of the Year, and Best Women’s Tennis Player.
Who is Britain’s Chinese-Romanian teen tennis star Emma Raducanu?
Osaka won while staying true to herself, speaking up for Black Lives Matter and more recently mental health. In doing so she pulled out of the French Open after being fined by the Roland Garros suits and then sat out Wimbledon.
The next 12 months saw her smash her own record, earning US$60 million, with a staggering US$55 million coming away from the court.
The world’s No 2 tennis player is undoubtedly No 1 when it comes to marketability – and this is before the possibility of the “face of the Olympics” winning gold for Japan or a third US Open crown when she returns to Flushing Meadows in September.
Osaka has ripped up the rule book when it comes to female athlete earnings but the similarly multicultural Raducanu is in position to take a page from Osaka’s book.
Naomi Osaka tops Forbes rich list for female athletes with US$37.4 million earnings
Born in San Francisco to a Chinese mother and American father, Gu decided to switch to Chinese citizenship in 2019 and the 18-year-old now competes for China.
She has shone since, winning China’s first X-Games medals – two golds and a bronze – then becoming the first Chinese freeskier to win multiple golds at the FIS Snowboard and Freeski World Championships in March.
Gu, who could be China’s flag-bearer at the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympic Games, has been crushing it off the slopes, too.
The sometime model has been on the cover of a number of magazines, such as Super Elle China, Champion and V Magazine.
She has the expected deals with the likes of Oakley – for whom she does sponsored social media posts – but also is a Tiffany & Co brand ambassador and a member of the Victoria’s Secret collective.
Eileen Gu wins China’s first Winter X Games gold as Beijing 2022 countdown begins
Who knows what the future holds for Raducanu but a few more slams like her Wimbledon debut and the world – from Toronto to London to Bucharest to Shenyang – will take notice.
Once they do, the marketers will surely follow.