Alex Eala’s Asian Games ended in bronze and a wave of “overrated” posts. Days later, Beijing’s top two seeds lost to lower-ranked players. The WTA still hasn’t ruled on her fine.
On October 3, Elena Rybakina played her first match as the new world No. 1 at the China Open in Beijing. She lost it to Alina Charaeva, ranked No. 118, 3-6, 6-4, 6-3. The next day, world No. 2 Aryna Sabalenka went out in the third round to 20-year-old Nikola Bartunkova, ranked No. 34, 6-4, 6-3.
Nobody in the Philippine comment sections called either of them a fraud.
Alex Eala, ranked No. 18, got that treatment twice in ten days: first after a loss to a world No. 180 in Singapore, then after an Asian Games semifinal that ended the gold-medal run she skipped Beijing to chase. A fine from the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) is still hanging over her, and nobody has issued it yet. In between, she had a week of moments that never made the scoreboard.
The Semifinal
Our last piece left Eala after a 55-minute win in an opener that rain moved twice. She then beat Chinese Taipei’s Joanna Garland in the quarterfinals, which guaranteed her a medal.
On October 1, she faced China’s Wang Xiyu, ranked No. 85, for a place in the gold-medal match. Eala took the first set 6-3. Wang won the next two, 6-3 and 6-2.
Asian Games tennis has no bronze-medal playoff, so both losing semifinalists get bronze. It’s Eala’s third Asian Games medal, after her bronzes in women’s singles and mixed doubles in Hangzhou. Gold would have carried an automatic singles place at the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, the biggest prize on the table in Nagoya.
Eala said she was happy to bring a bronze home and that she had nothing left to give. “I gave my all throughout this whole week,” she said. She added that being with the national team again, and feeling that camaraderie, was part of why she came to the Games in the first place.
The Upset Math
The criticism started before Nagoya. At the Singapore Tennis Open, a WTA 500 event, Eala was seeded third and lost in the round of 16 to Russia’s Tatiana Prozorova, ranked No. 180, 6-4, 5-7, 3-6. That match was the biggest win of Prozorova’s career, and the “overrated” posts followed within hours.
The Asian Games added a kind of pressure Eala rarely faces on tour. She was the top seed and the only top-50 player in the women’s singles draw, so every opponent across the net had nothing to lose and treated the match as a career highlight.
Beijing showed what that looks like at the very top of the sport. Rybakina arrived a few weeks after winning the US Open and admitted the stretch had worn her down. “I didn’t get a lot of chances to sleep and recover,” she said. Charaeva said she simply stayed tough mentally and kept believing she could turn the match around.
Eala’s calendar since the US Open has looked a lot like that: Singapore, then straight to Nagoya, then singles and doubles on a schedule the rain kept rearranging. A No. 85 beating a No. 18 in three sets is the kind of result women’s tennis produces most weeks. Two days after Eala’s semifinal, it happened to the No. 1.
The Fine Nobody Has Issued Yet
The China Open is a WTA 1000 event, the tier just below the four Grand Slams. Under WTA Rule II.A.1, players accepted directly into those mandatory events have to play them. Skipping one without an approved exemption means a $10,000 fine and possible ranking-point penalties.
The Philippine Tennis Association (PHILTA) asked for an exemption, a fight ElysPlanet covered when she made the call. Indonesia’s Janice Tjen faced the same clash, had her request denied, and went to Beijing. Eala went to Nagoya anyway and said she “didn’t take it lightly.”
Players on tour have questioned the rule. Jessica Pegula pointed out that the WTA approves plenty of exemptions, but the rulebook means the fine gets issued first and the player appeals afterward. Podcaster Chris Kneebone noted that a $10,000 fine for representing your country would be bigger than the $7,500 Sabalenka was fined for breaking a racket at the US Open.
The WTA has not announced a ruling.
The Finals Door, Closed
Skipping Beijing cost Eala something more certain than the fine. The WTA Finals, the season-ending event for the year’s eight best singles players, draws its field from the Race to the WTA Finals standings, with a cutoff of November 1.
Eala sits fifteenth or sixteenth in the Race, depending on the update, and more than 2,000 points behind eighth-placed Linda Noskova. The most she can earn before the cutoff is 2,000, so she can no longer qualify. Playing Beijing would have kept that chance alive.
The Cap
After her quarterfinal win, while Eala was signing autographs at Higashiyama Park Tennis Center, a man threw his cap at her to get her attention. He did it twice.
She picked it up and answered him on the spot: “Sir, hindi ka dapat nagtatapon ng mga gamit sa player. If you say it nicely, I will sign for you. Pero ‘wag ka magtapon. Please.”
He apologized, she signed the cap, and she handed it back. Most of the reaction online sided with her. She set a basic rule of courtesy in a sentence and still gave the fan what he came for.
The Pole Vaulter
The best stretch of Eala’s week happened away from the tennis court. On September 29, EJ Obiena cleared 5.91 meters to win his second straight Asian Games pole vault gold, breaking the Games record of 5.90 meters he set in Hangzhou. He did it in the rain and called the win “a bit of a rebirth, a little bit of a different me.”
Later in the Games, the two hit tennis balls together on the sidelines. Then they posted a TikTok, both wearing their medals and lip-syncing to Parokya ni Edgar’s “Akala.” Eala’s caption read: “With the GOAT 🇵🇠@EJ Obiena.”
It’s the clearest look yet at what Eala said she went to Nagoya for. She came home with a bronze and with a video of herself as part of the team.
What’s Next
Eala’s next tournament is the Wuhan Open, a WTA 1000 event in China running October 12 to 18. As a top-32 player, she gets a first-round bye. Rybakina and Sabalenka are in the draw, along with every other top-10 player. After Wuhan, she’s confirmed for the Hong Kong Open, a WTA 250 event, from November 2 to 8.