Alex Eala did not just play tennis on a sticky Manila night. She surfed the noise, stared down the pain, and converted Rizal Memorial into a very loud, very personal launchpad.
Before a crowd that sounded like it had collectively swallowed a megaphone, Eala powered past Japan’s Himeno Sakatsume, 6-4, 6-0, offering fresh proof that home court is not merely a comfort. On nights like this, it is a blunt instrument.
The opening act was honest work. Sakatsume pushed, poked, and prodded, refusing to follow the script reserved for a top seed. Eala, all of 20 and carrying the expectations of a world No. 49 ranking, did not flinch. She absorbed the heat, the rallies, and the pressure, then calmly seized control.
“Even with the score, it was close throughout the whole match,” Eala said afterward, gracious despite having slammed the door in the second set.
She was not selling modesty. The first set was a grind, the kind where one lazy swing rewrites the evening. Eala admitted she escaped trouble more than once, stealing points that looked borrowed, possibly misplaced. Manila approved. The crowd roared as if it had a personal stake in every deuce.
Then came the pause. Early in the second set, Eala called for trainers to tend to a heavily bandaged right thigh, the same one that complained earlier in the week. It was a hiccup, not a halt. Once play resumed, the rout followed.
Any Sakatsume comeback plans were drowned out by applause, prayers, and a Filipina who suddenly found another gear.
The victory lifts Eala into the quarterfinals of the inaugural Philippine Women’s Open, a WTA 125 event with $115,000 at stake and, suddenly, a very open draw. With top seed Tatjana Maria falling to Russia’s Tatiana Prozorova, Eala now stands as the highest seed left in the field.
Pain taped. Crowd buzzing. Path clearing.
Manila nights have hosted bigger spectacles. Not many have been this loud, or this promising.
