Aug 26, 2025, 07:45 AM ET<\/p>\n
On Sunday, Alex Eala<\/a> claimed a 6-3, 2-6, 7-6 (13-11) win over 14th seed Clara Tauson<\/a> in the first round of the US Open.<\/p>\n In doing so, she made history by becoming the first player from the Philippines<\/a> to win a singles main draw match at a tennis Grand Slam tournament.<\/p>\n With a single victory, the 20-year-old has captivated an entire nation — now all eagerly anticipating just how far she can go at Flushing Meadows.<\/p>\n Editor’s Picks<\/p>\n 2 Related<\/p>\n So when is she back in action? And who will be standing in her way?<\/p>\n Here’s all you need to know.<\/p>\n How she got this far<\/p>\n Eala pulled off an almighty upset in her win over Tauson, who currently sits an impressive 16th in the WTA rankings.<\/p>\n Compared to Eala, who is yet to claim a tournament victory, Tauson has three titles to her name — with the most recent coming at the Auckland Open back in January.<\/p>\n What was remarkable about Eala’s triumph is the fact that she was 5-1 down in the deciding set yet refused to give in, mounting a stirring fightback to win in a tiebreak and write herself in the history books.<\/p>\n Who will she face next<\/p>\n Eala’s reward for her momentous win is a second round meeting with Spain’s Cristina Buc\u0219a<\/a>.<\/p>\n On paper, this is a more straightforward test for Eala given she sits 20 places above the 95th-ranked Buc\u0219a, who is more of a doubles specialist, in the rankings.<\/p>\n Nonetheless, Eala will be aware not to underestimate her upcoming opponent given Buc\u0219a stormed into the second round with a dominant 6-2, 6-1 win over American Claire Liu<\/a>.<\/p>\n Buc\u0219a also earlier this year showed an ability to see off formidable opposition when she beat 2021 US Open champion Emma Raducanu in a marathon three-hour battle at the inaugural Singapore Tennis Open.<\/p>\n Should Eala prevail over Buc\u0219a, she will meet either 19th seed Elise Mertens<\/a> or New Zealand’s Lulu Sun<\/a> in the third round. A potential fourth-round opponent is the No.1-ranked Aryna Sabalenka<\/a>.<\/p>\n When is Eala next in action?<\/p>\n With the first round concluding on Tuesday, Eala’s meeting with Buc\u0219a is set to take place on Wednesday.<\/p>\n The order of play for Day 4 is yet to be released. Full details of Eala’s next match will be updated once Wednesday’s schedule is finalized.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Aug 26, 2025, 07:45 AM ET On Sunday, Alex Eala claimed a 6-3, 2-6, 7-6 (13-11) win over…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":111248,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[72],"tags":[99,428],"class_list":{"0":"post-111247","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-sports","9":"tag-tennis"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111247","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111247"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111247\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/111248"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111247"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111247"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111247"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}