World number 18 Eala is beaten 3-6 6-3 6-2 by 85th-ranked Xiyu, who will face compatriot Zhang Shuai in the final.<\/p>\n
Published On 1 Oct 20261 Oct 2026<\/p>\n
Alex Eala\u2019s hopes of a maiden Asian Games gold medal and qualification for \u2060\u2060the 2028 Los \u2060\u2060Angeles Olympics tennis tournament have been crushed by China\u2019s unheralded Wang Xiyu in the semifinals.<\/p>\n
World number 85 Xiyu rallied to a 3-6 6-3 6-2 win over the Filipino top \u2060\u2060seed at the games on Thursday.<\/p>\n
Eala, the Southeast Asian nation\u2019s first WTA title winner and a fan favourite on tour, was consigned to her second singles bronze medal and third in total, having \u2060\u2060also taken the mixed doubles bronze at Hangzhou three years ago.<\/p>\n
The 21-year-old gave up the chance to earn ranking points and prize money at the concurrent China Open to represent the Philippines in Nagoya and may get a fine and ranking penalty from the WTA for skipping \u200c\u200cthe mandatory event in Beijing.<\/p>\n
Eala said she had no regrets.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m really happy to have experienced this, to experience the support \u2026 and to be with the team and, yeah, to compete for the country,\u201d she said after the match.<\/p>\n
The world number 18 was on track for her first Asian Games final but her level dropped in the second set before she crumbled to a 4-1 deficit in the third.<\/p>\n
The 85th-ranked Wang \u2060\u2060fought off break points against the increasingly desperate Eala before \u2060\u2060serving out the match to love at Higashiyama Park Tennis Center.<\/p>\n
\u201c[Wang] was more consistent. I had a couple of ups and downs during the match, which is something I have to talk to my team \u2060\u2060about and process,\u201d said Eala.<\/p>\n
Wang will meet 37-year-old Zhang Shuai in an all-China final.<\/p>\n
She may have her hands full against former \u2060\u2060Wimbledon and Australian Open quarterfinalist Zhang, who rolled back \u2060\u2060the years to beat Kazakh Yulia Putintseva 6-4 6-2.<\/p>\n
Zhang has medalled at three previous Asian Games, taking silver in the 2018 singles in Jakarta and a team gold at the 2010 Guangzhou Games.<\/p>\n
She will \u200c\u200cbe in her 40s when the next games launch in Doha in 2030 but was not ruling out playing.<\/p>\n
\u201cI always feel like this may be my last games. But \u200c\u200clook, \u200c\u200caren\u2019t I here again?\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs long as you don\u2019t give up on yourself, no one else in this world can give you that death sentence.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"World number 18 Eala is beaten 3-6 6-3 6-2 by 85th-ranked Xiyu, who will face compatriot Zhang Shuai…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":912594,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[565],"tags":[77,64,63,941,277,588,85,747],"class_list":["post-912593","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-asia-pacific","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-japan","tag-philippines","tag-sport","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/912593","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=912593"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/912593\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/912594"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=912593"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=912593"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=912593"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}