Zheng Qinwen begins her 2026 season at the Qatar TotalEnergies Open on Monday, marking her first tournament appearance since a first-round exit at Wimbledon and just one event played since that loss. The former world No. 4 spent much of 2025 managing an elbow injury that forced her to miss last year’s US Open and this year’s Australian Open, where she was not fit to compete.

“I feel great to be back on the tour,” Zheng said on Saturday. “I especially missed the tournaments and the competition. I missed the way you have to put your blood into a match.”

Her most recent outing came at the China Open in Beijing, where she retired in the third round against Linda Noskova. After withdrawing from the first major tournament of the season, Zheng outlined the demands of Grand Slam level play and her recovery timeline.

“Although my recovery is progressing well and my offseason has gone smoothly, to play a Grand Slam requires players to maintain an extreme competitive condition,” Zheng explained after withdrawing from the first major tournament of the season. “Currently, I have not yet reached my best condition that I have set for myself.”

Before the elbow problem, Zheng produced strong results on clay, reaching the semifinals at the Internazionali BNL d’Italia and the quarterfinals at Roland Garros. At Rome she recorded a notable win over world No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka on her run to the semifinals. She was the runner-up at the Australian Open in 2023.

“It’s been a while,” Zheng said. “I never thought this injury would take me so long and a surgery. It was much longer than I thought. But I’m back and in better shape. I just hope I can do well at this tournament and give my best on court.”

Zheng’s return in Doha will be watched for signs of how close she is to the form that carried her to deep runs at major events and big clay tournaments in the season before the injury.

Sorana Cirstea produced a commanding performance to capture the Transylvania Open, defeating top seed Emma Raducanu 6-0, 6-2. The 35-year-old, who has said she will retire at the end of 2026, did not drop a set en route to her fourth career WTA singles title and closed the final in 63 minutes on Center Court in Cluj-Napoca.

Cirstea dominated early, winning the first eight games and delivering a first-set bagel against the former US Open champion. She reached the trophy after a week that included a quarterfinal victory over defending champion Anastasia Potapova and a semifinal in which Ukrainian Daria Snigur was held to three games.

A former world No. 21, Cirstea has displayed remarkable consistency over 20 years on tour, reaching two WTA quarterfinals and finishing 16 seasons ranked inside the Top 100. Her final Australian Open earlier this year ended in an emotional exchange when she lashed out at former world No. 1 Naomi Osaka at the net over perceived gamesmanship, but she sought to put that behind her in the days that followed.

“I never thought I would play for such a long time,” Cirstea said back in January. “I’m very, very grateful to have had such a long career. Of course, a little bit disappointed about tonight. I thought I could have done things better, but only one player can win, and she managed to do that better at the end.”

Raducanu arrived in the final on the back of a career resurgence, having finished 2025 inside the Top 30 and reaching her first final since winning the 2021 US Open. Her run in Cluj-Napoca included overcoming a 0-5 deficit in the second round against Kaja Juvan and a three-set win over Oleksandra Oliynykova in the quarterfinals, but she was unable to find enough rhythm against the veteran in the title match. Raducanu did take a medical timeout in the final and briefly halted Cirstea’s streak with a break, yet Cirstea reasserted control to close out the victory.

For the first time since her surprise U.S. Open triumph in 2021, Emma Raducanu will contest a trophy match. The top seed at the WTA 250 Transylvania Open in Cluj-Napoca advanced to the final by defeating unseeded Oleksandra Oliynykova 7-5, 3-6, 6-3 in Friday’s semifinal.

Raducanu had been 0-3 in tour-level semifinals since her run of 10 consecutive victories at Flushing Meadows in 2021, where she became the first qualifier to win a Grand Slam singles title in the Open Era. She broke that streak by outlasting world No. 91 Oliynykova in a match that lasted two hours and 49 minutes.

The Brit received medical attention on her shoulder late in the first set but still built a 7-5, 3-1 advantage. Oliynykova, who parlayed a headline-grabbing performance against 2025 champion Madison Keys at the Australian Open into her first-ever tour-level semifinal this week, responded strongly. The Ukrainian won five straight games, seven of eight, to take the second set and became the first player to break serve in the third set.

Raducanu recovered in the decider, winning 16 consecutive points from 2-1, 15-15, and ultimately closing out the match after surviving a tense seventh game in which she failed to convert two match points on the return and then served out the victory after saving a pair of break points. She came from a break down in the final set to complete the comeback.

Raducanu credited the crowd and expressed a strong connection to the setting, saying she really feels “at home” in Romania, the birthplace of her father. She singled out the match-long challenge posed by her opponent and praised the support that helped her through the encounter.

“I think all props to my opponent today. Oli, she played incredible and makes it so tricky to get any ball past her,” Raducanu said afterwards. “You think it’s past her and then the ball is on your baseline or your sideline, so it’s so difficult.

“I’m most proud of how I competed, how I came back in the third set, and how I managed the match, but I don’t know if I could’ve done it without everyone’s support today.”

© 2026 Horvath Tamas