Forced into a challenging position at Roland Garros on Monday, Emerson Jones leant on the experience she gained in a recent stint with Australia’s Billie Jean King Cup team.

The No. 1 seed in the Roland Garros junior girls’ singles was challenged strongly by promising American Capucine Jauffret but reset to progress 6-1 1-6 6-2 in 1hr 47min.

After winning the ITF World Tennis Tour Junior Finals in China last year, Jones demonstrated her potential at senior level by beating Wang Xin Yu in the Adelaide International in January.

The 16-year-old recently won an ITF W35 title in Fukuoka, which followed a semi-final appearance in an ITF W100 tier event in Gifu, during a successful visit to Japan.

Jones said the experience of serving as an “orange girl”, a role Australian national teams offer to talented juniors, in BJK Cup ties in Brisbane in April had been invaluable.

Having practiced with 2019 Roland Garros champion Ashleigh Barty in her early teens, she said the time training with Ajla Tomljanovic, Kimberley Birrell and Maya Joint under Australia’s BJK Cup captain Sam Stosur, a former US Open champion, was incredible.

“I loved the team. They were all such great girls, and the whole atmosphere was great. They're all really nice and supportive,” she said.

“For me to be in the team, watching Kim and Maya play, that was a great experience because I could learn a lot from them and I did. And Ajla, training against her, practicing with all of them, I definitely learned quite a few things.”

Joint, 19, is the closest of the team in age to Jones and won her first WTA Tour title in Rabat in the week before Roland Garros after building her ranking on the ITF Tour in recent years.

“I mean, Maya pretty much went from not (having a) ranking to pretty much the top 50 really quick, which shows obviously that anything's possible,” Jones said. “It’s great. She's really inspiring and she is a great person, so it is really great for her.”

This is the 16-year-old’s third appearance in the junior singles at Roland Garros, which included a run to the last 16 in 2023 before an opening round exit last year.

The daughter of Loretta Harrop, who won an Olympic silver medal in triathlon in Athens in 2004, Jones finished strongly against Jauffret in a demonstration of her own endurance.

Jauffret, who deserves credit for the manner with which she tested her highly-rated rival, has an interesting back story.

The American’s grandfather Francois Jauffret was a superb player who hails from France and twice reached the semi-finals of Roland Garros, while also pushing legendary Swedish champion Bjorn Borg to five sets in a tournament he dominated in 1976.

His granddaughter is a promising player and Jones was forced to dig deep to progress.

“Every tournament is different, even if it's the same one, because you play different opponents,” Jones said. “So you have just got to focus on who's in front of you and not about the winning and losing just before the match and just try to play your best.

“She lifted her level, definitely, in the second set and I probably dropped mine and bit and realised I needed to probably up my level in the third set and play the same way as I did in the first.”

Returning to junior level poses its own challenges and Jones needed to look no further than other opening round results to understand that there is great depth in the girls’ singles draw.

Seeded players including No. 2 Kristina Penickova, third seed Jeline Vandromme, No. 4 Teodora Kostovic, No. 5 Tereza Krejcova and No. 6 Luna Vujovic all exited in the first round.

Jones said there is always a determination to perform at every event, but playing against more experienced rivals in ITF and WTA Tour events was a worthwhile experience.

French fans had much to enjoy on Monday with the performance of wildcard entrant Daphnee Mpetshi Perricard, who won a round in the senior qualifying event last month.

The sister of French star Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard, the 16-year-old defeated Serbian Petra Konjikusic 6-3 6-4 and will play No. 11 seed Zhang Ruien from China in the second round.

While Jones was among those to play opening round matches on Tuesday, a handful of junior girls have already reached the third round of the clay court tournament.

Rositsa Dencheva, who ousted No. 2 seed Penickova on Sunday, defeated Brazil’s Nauhany Vitoria Leme Da Silva 7-6 (5) 6-2 and will play No. 16 seed Laimi Vladson next.