Eala withdraws from 125 Catalonia Open

FILIPINO tennis ace Alex Eala withdrew from the WTA 125 Catalonia Open set from April 27 to May 3 in Spain.

Initially on the player list, Eala's name was nowhere to be found when the official tournament draw was released late Sunday night in Manila.

Eala also pulled out of last year's edition of the tournament.

The other players who also withdrew from the tournament this year are Leylah Fernandez, Ann Li, and Katerina Siniakova.

Catalonia would have been Eala's second 125-tier tournament of the year after the inaugural Philippine Women's Open last January.

Instead, Eala will head straight to the 1000 Italian Open, which will run from May 5 to 17.

The 20-year-old Eala is coming off a second-round exit in singles and doubles at the 1000 Madrid Open.

World No. 44 Eala defeated veteran and 12-time champ Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova of Russia, 6-3, 6-3, in the singles first round.

The lefty netter fell to world No. 21 Elise Mertens in the second round, 2-6, 1-6, last Friday.

In the doubles competition, Eala and Turkish partner Zeynep Sönmez started their campaign with a 6-2, 6-2 win over the Taiwanese-Hungarian pair of Chan Hao-ching and Fanny Stollar.

Eala and Sönmez then fell to the elite Czech-American duo of Katerina Siniakova and Taylor Townsend, 1-6, 5-7, in the second round last Saturday.

Eala bagged a total of €47,195 in prize money or P3.3 million after ending her Madrid campaign.

She pocketed €31,585 or P2.2 million for reaching the singles round of 64 (second round) and an additional share of €15,610 or P1.1 million for making the doubles round of 16 (second round) for the said total.

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