NAGOYA, Oct 3 \u2014 Alexandra Eala admitted yesterday that she gets \u201coverwhelmed sometimes\u201d by the huge weight of expectation placed on her as a trailblazer for tennis in the Philippines.<\/p>\n
The 21-year-old leaves the Asian Games having fallen short of her ambition to win gold for her country, instead settling for bronze.<\/p>\n
Eala is followed everywhere by adoring fans eager for a piece of the world number 18, who in August became the first player from the Philippines to win a title on the women\u2019s WTA Tour.<\/p>\n
\u201cI definitely do get overwhelmed sometimes,\u201d said Eala.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I understand that it\u2019s such a privilege to be in the position that I\u2019m in and to be able to live out the dreams that I\u2019ve always had as a kid.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo it\u2019s something I\u2019ve had to accept that it comes with the job, and this is how things are.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m ready for the challenge.\u201d<\/p>\n
Eala, who skipped the prestigious China Open in Beijing to play for her country at the Asian Games, said she would take away good memories despite exiting in the semi-finals in a three-set defeat to China\u2019s lower-ranked Wang Xinyu.<\/p>\n
Wang went on to beat compatriot Zhang Shuai to win gold yesterday.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt does come with pressure, but I\u2019m really happy that I was able to compete here,\u201d said Eala, who was the top seed.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo be able to share it with the Filipino people is really important,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo regrets. I left everything on the court,\u201d said Eala.<\/p>\n
With Games gold comes direct qualification for the Los Angeles 2028 Olympics.<\/p>\n
Eala said it was still her \u201cdream\u201d to play in LA.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are other ways of qualifying for the Olympics, so I guess it\u2019s also an extra motivation,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cCompeting in the Olympics is definitely a dream of mine. So, if anything, I leave here more motivated.\u201d \u2014 AFP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NAGOYA, Oct 3 \u2014 Alexandra Eala admitted yesterday that she gets \u201coverwhelmed sometimes\u201d by the huge weight of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":918588,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[30434,85574,49,48,316403,235753,154330,82,593,20436],"class_list":["post-918587","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-alexandra-eala","tag-asian-games","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-los-angeles-2028-olympics","tag-nagoya","tag-philippines-tennis","tag-sports","tag-tennis","tag-wta-tour"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/918587","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=918587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/918587\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/918588"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=918587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=918587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=918587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}