{"id":738907,"date":"2026-08-15T14:32:34","date_gmt":"2026-08-15T14:32:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/738907\/"},"modified":"2026-08-15T14:32:34","modified_gmt":"2026-08-15T14:32:34","slug":"i-want-to-be-eala-philippine-sensation-sparks-tennis-boom-at-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/738907\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018I want to be Eala\u2019: Philippine sensation sparks tennis boom at home"},"content":{"rendered":"

MANILA \u2013 On a Manila court made of crushed seashells, an earnest four-year-old sends a forehand sailing wide \u2013 one of dozens of children aiming to follow in the footsteps of the Philippines\u2019 first home-grown tennis sensation, Alexandra Eala<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The 21-year-old\u2019s rise has sparked a rush of interest in a sport typically seen as the preserve of the elite in a country best known for its love of basketball, boxing and cockfighting.<\/p>\n

Racket sales are up and scoring one of the few available playing venues has become next to impossible as parents cram their pre-schoolers onto practice courts.<\/p>\n

\u201cApart from just bringing in people to watch, she\u2019s actually (got) people to play,\u201d Philippine Tennis Association (PhilTA) executive director Tonette Mendoza told AFP.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe the parents of these kids, they\u2019re thinking, \u2018Hey, if we do this, maybe they can be the next Alex\u2019,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

A now-famous photo of Eala diving flat out for a ball at Wimbledon\u2019s Centre Court was all it took to convince nine-year-old Mayumi Stevens.<\/p>\n

\u201cI felt like, \u2018Wow, that\u2019s going to be me\u2019,\u201d Stevens told AFP as she waited to train alongside older pre-teens at the Alabang Tennis Academy in an exclusive Manila suburb.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to be Eala when I grow up.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Onto the bandwagon\u2019<\/p>\n

French sporting goods retailer Decathlon is among the companies riding the Eala wave in the Philippines, busily reworking its store displays and social media after seeing sales of beginner rackets spike 66 per cent in the past year.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe really had to jump onto the bandwagon… creating content that\u2019s very relatable, that\u2019s very timely for whatever\u2019s happening with Alex right now,\u201d partnerships and communications manager Vince Roque told AFP.<\/p>\n

PhilTA estimates there are fewer than 1,000 tennis courts in the sprawling archipelago.<\/p>\n

Many are shell courts unique to the Philippines \u2013 a mix of crushed seashells, sand and clay that cost less to build and maintain than red clay.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s super crazy to book tennis courts nowadays,\u201d said Under-14 and U-12 national girls\u2019 team coach Czarina Arevalo, adding she never imagined she would see a Filipina in the world\u2019s top 20.<\/p>\n

Eala, a former US Open girls champion, made the leap to 20th in the WTA rankings just over a year after reaching her first Grand Slam tournament, the 2025 French Open.<\/p>\n

\"Alexandra<\/p>\n

Alexandra Eala of the Philippines at Sobeys Stadium in Canada on Aug 7.<\/p>\n

PHOTO: AFP<\/p>\n

The unexpected rise has spawned an army of loyal Philippine fans. Many of the nation\u2019s 10 million-strong diaspora, forced overseas in search of better-paying jobs, are now paying hundreds of dollars for centre-court seats and leaving traditional notions of prim tennis etiquette at the door.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople were screaming like in a basketball match,\u201d PhilTA\u2019s Mendoza said of Eala\u2019s appearance at the Australian Open earlier in 2026.<\/p>\n

Some \u201chad never watched a tennis match in their entire lives\u201d, Mendoza said, adding the level of excitement was understandable. \u201cShe\u2019s our first who\u2019s gone this far.\u201d<\/p>\n

After reaching the fourth round of Wimbledon in July, Eala won her first WTA title earlier in August, sweeping aside former world No. 1 Naomi Osaka and Jessica Pegula in Washington.<\/p>\n

Lonely at the top<\/p>\n

Outside of Eala, the Philippines is glaringly absent from the sport\u2019s upper echelons, with just four men ranked by the ATP and none in the top 1,000. Eala is the sole ranked Filipina.<\/p>\n

Public courts are few and far between in the nation of 116 million, and a good racket can be a month\u2019s wages for many Filipinos.<\/p>\n

Eala\u2019s bid for tennis greatness required leaving home at 13 for a scholarship at Rafael Nadal\u2019s tennis academy in Spain.<\/p>\n

Mendoza said most of the top Philippine players end up going to school in the US and later into coaching, some \u201cout of necessity\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"This<\/p>\n

Children taking part in a training session at Alabang Tennis Academy in Muntinlupa, Metro Manila.<\/p>\n

PHOTO: AFP<\/p>\n

Local governments are now rushing to build hard courts, often in multi-purpose facilities that can accommodate several sports.<\/p>\n

Decathlon said the sports chain has been fielding a rising tide of sponsorship requests from communities that are building tennis courts and putting on clinics.<\/p>\n

PhilTA is set to break ground in 2026 on a government-backed National Tennis Centre north of Manila that will feature an academy and an 8,000-capacity stadium.<\/p>\n

The more Philippine children take up the sport, the better the odds of finding the next Eala, said PhilTA\u2019s Mendoza.<\/p>\n

That player is \u201cnot in the pipeline yet\u201d, she conceded. \u201cBut I\u2019m sure there\u2019s someone out there.\u201d AFP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MANILA \u2013 On a Manila court made of crushed seashells, an earnest four-year-old sends a forehand sailing wide…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":738908,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[101,118,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-738907","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-sports","tag-tennis","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/738907","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=738907"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/738907\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/738908"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=738907"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=738907"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=738907"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}