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NEW YORK — Alex Eala has been filling tennis stadiums all over the world this past year, buoyed by more than 11 million overseas Filipinos. Packed crowds in Australia, Dubai, Toronto, and this week, New York, have felt “Eala Mania,” decorating relatively docile tennis crowds with Philippine flags and “Laban Alex!” signs.
Eala is a complete anomaly for her country. No other Filipina had even made the top 250 before her, and she’s already cracked the top 20 before the year’s final major following her maiden WTA title at the DC Open earlier this month. The 21-year-old even has current stars already labeling her the future of the sport.
Her unprecedented ascent has led Filipino fans to fly across the country to see her play. One group even planned their college reunion around her first appearance at the Cincinnati Open a few weeks ago.
But because of the nomadic nature of tennis, Eala is barely able to witness how she’s impacting the other 117 million Filipinos in her home country.
“I think because I’m always traveling and I’m on tour, I’m quite out of touch sometimes with what my impact is back home, for the good and the bad. I think that’s why I said a couple of times that when I went back home, it really opened my eyes,” Eala said in response to a question from FOS at the Cincinnati Open.
The last time she played in the Philippines was the Philippine Women’s Open in January, a WTA 125 event that was the first in the country’s history. She easily sold out the 2,000-seat stadium in Manila for the tournament earlier this year. Fans in the country have even held watch parties of her WTA Tour matches in stadiums.
They will finally be able to watch her in-person again after Tatler Philippines announced Friday that she will play an exhibition match against Indonesian pro Janice Tjen in December. The exhibition will take place at the Philippine Arena, a 55,000-seat venue that could smash the record attendance for a tennis match.
“A lot of my matches are overseas—no, 99% of my matches are overseas. So for me to be back home and playing in front of the people in the Philippines, it’s going to be super special,” Eala said Friday during her US Open press conference.
Philippine Tennis Association executive director Tonette Mendoza tells FOS that Eala’s impact goes far beyond selling out stadiums. According to Mendoza, she’s completely changed the Philippine government’s view on the sport.
“It’s easier to ask the government for funding for facilities, like if we’d like to build or refurbish a tennis center or build a regional tennis center,” Mendoza tells FOS. “At least it’s there now because they can see na pwede pala (that it’s possible). Because before, it really felt like a very, very far dream.”
Mendoza said that COVID-19 the pandemic accelerated the sport’s growth; lockdowns in the country lasted more than a year, and for a while, tennis was one of the only sports the government allowed citizens to play. But Eala has allowed the government to believe Filipinos can compete globally in the sport.
PhilTA estimates there are less than 1,000 courts in the country, most of which are now packed, pushing local governments to build more. Late last year, the organization acquired nearly 25 acres of land where it plans to construct a Philippine Tennis Center that will be a central hub to train its future tennis stars.
She also said Eala’s rise has helped push PhilTA’s grassroots agendas, from working with World Tennis (formerly the International Tennis Federation) to certify more coaches to trying to bring tennis, known as a sport for the elite, into the country’s public school system.
“The more people play, of course, the better it is for everyone’s health,” Mendoza said. “But also, there are more people to choose from, di ba? (right?) You will get more good people, more people who will have potential, rather than you just have like 100 people playing.”
Bee Go, founder of Atleta Filipina who has covered Eala since she was 13, tells FOS that fully booked tennis courts are often filled with young girls hoping to become the next Filipina star.
“Alex has really impacted the rise of the sport among young girls,” Go said. “You’ll see videos now of kids saying: ‘I really want to be Alex Eala,’ so that’s why a lot of kids take up tennis.’”
And yet, the young star consistently defers when asked about her impact.
“I think that every single WTA player and every single ATP player has contributed to the world of tennis and its history just by being here and by putting in the work every single day. Although there are certain things … that make me stand out, I think that I’m a drop in the ocean when it comes to these things,” Eala said Friday.
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