\n<\/p>\n
In a parallel universe, Francesca Jones might now be sitting at home preparing applications for university courses.<\/b><\/p>\n
Instead, the 25-year-old Briton is preparing for the Australian Open after a life-changing season that has pumped new energy into her tennis career.<\/p>\n
Jones, who has a rare genetic condition which means she plays with a modified grip, has defied the odds to compete among the elite.<\/p>\n
The world number 71 was born with Ectrodactyly Ectodermal Dysplasia (EEC), leaving her with three fingers and a thumb on each hand, three toes on her right foot and four toes on her left.<\/p>\n
Doctors told the Yorkshire-born player to forget about playing professionally and the physical challenges have continued during her career.<\/p>\n
After a difficult 2024 and finding herself outside the world’s top 150, Jones decided to retire if her results and ranking did not improve in the next season.<\/p>\n
Instead, she made 2025 the best year of her career and will hope to continue that progress when she takes on Polish qualifier Linda Klimovicova in her Melbourne opener on Monday.<\/p>\n
“I was very serious [about retiring]. It was a case of going all out for one more year,” said Jones, who has received direct entry into a Grand Slam for the first time.<\/p>\n
“If I would have been [ranked] 101, I wasn’t going to quit. But it was a feeling that I had.<\/p>\n
“It was smaller objectives that, if I completed those, would have led to me being in the top 100.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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In a parallel universe, Francesca Jones might now be sitting at home preparing applications for university courses. Instead, the 25-year-old Briton is preparing for the Australian Open after a life-changing season that has pumped new energy into her tennis career. Jones, who has a rare genetic condition which means she plays with a modified grip,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6217,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6216","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6216","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6216"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6216\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6217"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6216"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6216"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6216"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}