Croatian tennis player Tereza Mrdeža (35), who had seemingly retired from professional tennis, has surprised everyone by earning a substantial amount of money in Grand Slam qualifiers. After her maternity leave and the opening of her tennis academy, Mrdeža returned to tournaments, earning tens of thousands of euros.

The Poreč native was actively competing in tournaments until March 2022. She then had a brief appearance at a tournament in Monastir, Tunisia, in January 2023. During her break, she became a mother and founded a tennis academy. She took advantage of a protected ranking to enter the Australian Open qualifiers, where she lost 6-0, 6-3 to 18-year-old Serbian Teodora Kostović.

"I took a risk, bought a ticket a few days early, and entered the tournament due to withdrawals. I had good fortune at the end of my career," she said earlier this year.

For that appearance, she was rewarded with 40,500 Australian dollars, or about 23,000 euros. This past Monday, she played in Paris at the start of the Roland Garros qualifiers, where she was defeated by Belgian Sofia Costoulas, ranked 144th in the world, 6-2, 6-0.

The French will reward her with 24,000 euros for appearing in the qualifiers for the only clay-court Grand Slam, making this trip highly profitable. Over her career, which began in 2007, she has earned around 600,000 US dollars. She played in the main draw of a Grand Slam once, at the 2015 US Open, and remembers her best ranking as 150th. She has won eight ITF tournaments.