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Former Australian No.1 Daria Gavrilova will play her first grand slam event in more than a year after learning to play with chronic foot injuries.
Three years ago, Daria Gavrilova marched out of Roland Garros as Australia's top-ranked women's tennis player, having snapped Samantha Stosur's record 442-week unbroken reign as the country's queen of the court.
After battling chronic foot injuries for the past 18 months, Gavrilova arrived in Paris this week as world No.785 and needing an injury protected ranking to take her place in Friday's French Open draw.
But the one-time world No.20 and former junior No.1 still feels like a winner ahead of her long-awaited grand slam comeback at Roland Garros.
"I'm pretty happy to be here," Gavrilova told AAP.
"I wouldn't judge my success by my results because my team and I have worked so hard just to get here.
"That's already a pretty positive start and then I just really want to compete hard and hopefully make myself proud."
Gavrilova endured a season from hell in 2019, picking up plantar fasciitis before last year's Australian Open, having also battled a chronic Achilles injury since 2016.
She eventually aborted her season after suffering her 14th first-round defeat in 18 events at last year's US Open.
"I should have stopped after Wimbledon but I felt my tennis was still there but physically I couldn't compete," Gavrilova said.
Now she thinks she can again.
"But I'm always on the cautious side with my Achilles because I never know when it's going to flare up," the 26-year-old said.
"But I'm pretty good at dealing with it now and it doesn't distract me and I still have the confidence I can play almost my best tennis even though I have niggles."
Gavrilova picked a tough time, during a pandemic, to make a return but says she more concerned about having to endure two COVID-19 tests in 48 hours before being given the green light to escape hotel isolation.
"They go pretty deep in France in the nostril," said the former Australian Fed Cup regular.
Gavrilova faces a challenging first-round test against 24th seed Dayana Yastremska.
But the feisty baseliner has grown in belief after notching five wins to reach the quarter-finals from qualifying at an ITF claycourt lead-up in regional France.
Gavrilova, though, isn't placing any pressure on herself.
"I don't think it's good for me mentally. It just creates anxiety," she said.
"All I can do is just focus on how hard I can compete. I just try and do my thing and try and enjoy myself because, honestly, I didn't last year."
