Maya Joint credits her win over Serena Williams at Wimbledon as the “real turning point” of her year after she continued her strong end to the campaign with a straight sets win over fellow Australian Maddison Inglis in her opening match at the Prudential Hong Kong Tennis Open.

The 20-year-old, who hit a career-high ranking of world No 28 in February, endured a nightmare period after reaching the quarter-finals of the Adelaide International in January, losing nine matches in a row and gaining just one win in 13 matches before meeting Williams at Wimbledon.

Joint showed incredible resilience, however, and defied the crowd and much of the tennis fraternity by defeating the legendary 39-time grand slam champion in a three-set first-round marathon, which was a huge boon to her confidence.

“I’m proud of myself for being able to regroup and still have a successful second half of the year. I think I’ve learned a lot from the first half and I just think next year will be better,” Joint said.

“The match against Serena was a real turning point. I think it gave me the confidence I needed to just prove to myself that I could still win matches.

“It’s definitely tough and I probably wasn’t doing the best job of keeping my spirits high at the beginning [of the year], but I was just trusting that it can’t always be like this.

“I was just hoping for my game to come back and I was working really hard on the practice court to try and figure out what I needed to do and how I could start winning again.”

Dropping to world No 99 in September after a tough summer, she regrouped and has ended the year with a real flourish, reaching the final of the WTA250 Korea Open and losing in the quarter-finals of the WTA500 Tokyo Open.

Despite the trials and tribulations, Joint is still able to crack a smile about her disappointing start to 2026 and is firmly looking ahead to 2027 with a view of making up for any lost time.

“I don’t have any points to defend for the first six months of the year, so it can only go up next year,” Joint joked.

“I think I’m always working on my serve and just working on strategic things in my game to try and be more of an all-court player.”

Before that comes around, however, Joint is hoping to make a deep run in Hong Kong, after making the best possible start to her campaign with a 7-5, 6-2 victory over her friend Inglis.

A topsy-turvy start to the game saw Joint hold her serve, before quickly following up by breaking Inglis. The response from Inglis was swift, however, as she broke straight back in a tight deuce tussle.

Both players settled down into their rhythms soon after, with each holding their serve in seven straight games, but Joint began to wrestle the upper hand and engineered a set point at 4-5, but was unable to take advantage.

After holding to love in the next game, however, she would go on to win four more points on the bounce to secure the set 7-5.

It briefly looked as though Inglis was staging a rally early in the second set, after she fended off three break points for a crucial hold to make it 1-1 before breaking her compatriot, but Joint soon squashed any momentum she was building by breaking back as she rocketed to five games on the bounce to close out the match 6-2.

The win sets up a clash with fourth seed Maria Sakkari on Thursday – a match Joint is looking forward to.

“It’s always tough to play a friend, she came out and was playing really well. I needed to figure out some things and what was working, and I think I took the first set to try and figure that stuff out. Then in the second set, I felt like I had more of a plan of what to do,” Joint said.

“I think it’s always good to get the breaks straight back. It’s always tough to come back in a set when you’re down a break the whole time, so I was pretty happy to get it right back.

“It’s been really nice – I love coming back here. I love this event a lot, so hopefully I can stick around here a couple days longer.

“I’ve never played Maria before, so I’m going to have to watch some footage and see some of her matches to get a feel, but I think it’s going to be a good match.”