LOUISE Hunt is happy to accept a short-term dip in her rankings in 2017 in the hope she reaps the benefits in the long term.

Wanborough wheelchair tennis ace Hunt has been ranked in the top 10 in the world in both singles and doubles in the past 12 months but is currently just outside that mark for both.

This time last year, Hunt had just returned to the UK after a three-tournament trip to Australia as she looked to shore up her qualification for the Rio Paralympics.

However, the 26-year-old has not made the trip Down Under this year and as a result, her ranking has been hurt by the dropping of those points.

Hunt, who will play her first tournament since November at next week’s North West Challenge in Preston, has put an emphasis on training this season ahead of competitive matches.

“I’m putting a lot more hours in at home in the gym and on the practice court,” said Hunt, who also competed at London 2012.

“With a Paralympics year, you don’t really get the time to do that because of travelling and trying to pick up points at tournaments.

“This year is the perfect opportunity to do some big training blocks and I will have more tournaments in the middle and towards the end of the year.

“I want to be better than 10th in the world but I recognise that to get better, I need to take time away to train hard to improve.

“Being back in the top 10 is 100 per cent a goal of mine, but when that is a goal for, we haven’t set an exact date.

“I am only playing two tournaments in this block, whereas I am defending points from six tournaments, so my rankings are going to drop but it’s a year where you can afford for it to happen.

“I don’t want to be sat at 10th in the world, I have done that, so now I want to go to the next level and to do that I need to work hard.”

Hunt, who competed in the inaugural women’s wheelchair singles competition at Wimbledon last summer, was last month again given the backing of long-term sponsors Imagine Cruising in her bid to represent Team GB at a third Paralympics in Tokyo in 2020.

Although the Games remains at the back of her mind, Hunt’s main focus is on the here and now.

“For me, Tokyo is a bit too far ahead. I am a day-by-day person and of course Tokyo is on the horizon but I just want to focus on this year and my goals for this year,” said Hunt.

“It’s the same as what I did from London to Rio, I just rolled onto the next cycle. Everything we are doing now is for the long-term goal, which is Tokyo, but I just try to focus on the little steps because it is so daunting thinking of it as it’s still more than three years away.”