Alex Eala qualifies for Jingshan Open quarterfinals
Alex Eala continues to reach for the stars as she has now advanced to the Jingshan Open quarterfinals.
The Filipino tennis star qualified for the next round in the tournament held in China after scoring a win against Japan’s Mei Yamaguchi in a 6-0, 6-3 match.
Eala, who is the top seed at the WTA 125 Challenger 100 event, had a strong momentum in the opening set, but Yamaguchi mounted a brief comeback in the second and managed to get on the scoreboard.
However, Eala quickly regained her focus and closed out the final two games.
With this, the 20-year-old athlete is slated to compete against Jia-Jing Lu of China on Sept. 26, who won her match against Riya Bhatia of India.
Eala has had an eventful stretch of tournaments in recent months.
At the Miami Open in March, she wrote history after defeating Australian Open champion Madison Keys. She's the first Filipino player to beat a Top 10 opponent since the ranking system was introduced 50 years ago.
In late August, she became the first player from the Philippines to win a Grand Slam singles match with a first-round upset of Danish 14th seed Clara Tauson.
She later won the Guadalajara 125 Open on Sept. 7 and became the first Filipino to win a WTA singles title.