British tennis star Emma Raducanu has offered up to five extra security guards to play at Indian Wells after being targeted by a ‘stalker’ in Dubai.
Raducanu is eager to move on from the ‘terrifying’ ordeal, which led to her breaking down in tears and hiding behind the umpire’s chair during a clash against Karolina Muchova at the Dubai Tennis Championships last week.
It later emerged that the 22-year-old became distressed when she spotted a man displaying ‘fixated behaviour’ in the crowd, who is alleged to have followed her over four countries and approached her before the match.
The ‘calculated’ individual, who was swiftly thrown out, reportedly gave Raducanu a letter in an off-site incident and has since been handed a restraining order by Dubai police and banned from all future tournaments.
Raducanu returned home to the United Kingdom after her Dubai Tennis Championships exit and is next set to play at the prestigious Indian Wells tournament in California, which gets underway next week in early March.
Indian Wells organisers are keen to ensure Raducanu feels safe at the event with the Briton ‘likely’ to be offered up to five extra security guards, The Times have reported, with Bob Campbell in charge of arrangements.
Campbell, vice-president of security for the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) Tour, worked as a secret service agent for 20 years in the United States and reportedly had a prominent role during Bill Clinton’s presidency.
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Should Raducanu decide to accept the offer of extra security, the guards will work to ensure her safety while on-site at Indian Wells, while it is also possible they could accompany her off-site back to her accommodation.
Raducanu and IMG, her management company, have the option of hiring private security too. However, the 2021 US Open winner has previously turned down additional protection, such as when she was targeted in 2022.
‘Thank you for the messages of support,’ Raducanu posted on her Instagram account about the incident in Dubai last week. ‘Difficult experience but I’ll be okay and proud of how I came back and competed despite what happened at the start of the match.’
Roman Kelecic, who has been working with Raducanu temporarily while she seeks a new permanent coach after a split with Nick Cavaday, claimed on Friday that the alleged ‘stalker’ had been following her since Singapore.
Raducanu headed to Singapore in late January and then travelled to the United Arab Emirates for the Abu Dhabi Open, with the Brit later playing in Qatar before a second trip to the UAE for the Dubai Tennis Championships.
‘This man followed her to Singapore, to Abu Dhabi – where I was with her – again in Doha, now in Dubai and we noticed him,’ Kelecic, who also coached Raducanu as a junior, told Croatian outlet Net.
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‘Initially we thought he was a fan… until he got physically close to her, started having contact in the form of selfies, hugging.
‘That man was assessing the situation and looking for the best moment to get closer to her. He had a strategy that was terrifying, he thought everything through, calculated it.
‘It’s terrifying how much he, in essence, thought about it all and planned it. His strategy worked, and it was to get closer to her.
‘Three or four hours before the match [in Dubai against Muchova] we have a photo of that stalker. Not only us, the entire security at the tournament has his photo and everyone knows who he is.
‘The first game, two points gone, 15-15, Emma is on the other side of the court and she’s showing us something. At that moment we didn’t know what it was. Emma loses the first game and runs to us, crying, shouting, ‘here he is, here he is, here he is’.’