I Said I Would Have Said No. Alex Eala Said Yes — and Lost in 76 Minutes.
I Said I Would Have Said No. Alex Eala Said Yes — and Lost in 76 Minutes.
The wildcard pairing with Venus Williams ended Thursday night at Sobeys Stadium, 4-6, 3-6. Tonight Eala plays Caty McNally — a doubles specialist — for a place in the round of 16.
I watched this one alone.
Wednesday, when Eala beat Alycia Parks, I was at my sister Joy's house, because I did not have the Tennis Channel and my Fubo package did not carry it. Thursday I cancelled Fubo and subscribed to the Tennis Channel directly. So Thursday night I sat in my own living room in Vallejo and watched Alex Eala and Venus Williams lose to Miyu Kato and Liudmila Samsonova, 4-6, 3-6, in seventy-six minutes.
Two days ago on this site I wrote that if it had been my call, she would not have played doubles in Toronto. I want to be honest about what I got right and what I did not, and then get to the part that actually matters, which is that she plays Caty McNally tonight.
💬 Please comment below ↓
Meaning: Rest. A pause. Time off.
The root is hinga — to breathe. Pahinga is not laziness and it is not quitting; it is the breath you take so you can keep going. Filipino families are not always good at this. We were raised on overtime and second jobs and the idea that stopping is a character flaw. Tell somebody you love to take a pahinga this week.
Seventy-Six Minutes
Kato and Samsonova did what every experienced doubles team does when one half of the other side is a 46-year-old legend playing her second tournament of the summer: they hit at her. They targeted Venus, took a tight opening set 6-4, then broke open the second with a 4-0 run and closed it out 6-3.
The numbers are unglamorous. Eala and Williams served five double faults and faced eleven break points, conceding six of them. Six breaks of serve in twenty games is not a near-miss. It was over in an hour and sixteen minutes, which is the shortest thing Alex Eala has been involved in for a week and a half.
It was their second tournament together. The first, at Bad Homburg in June, went to the quarterfinals, and Williams posted afterward that it was the best ride, the best tournament, the best partner. Nobody should pretend Thursday erased that. But the Toronto version lasted less time than most of Eala's singles sets this month.
Caty McNally Is Not a Consolation Prize
Here is the part the odds are underselling.
McNally is 24, ranked No. 70 in singles, and carrying a 14-8 record for 2026. Those numbers make her look like a comfortable third-round opponent for a player ranked twentieth in the world. She is not.
She got to this round by beating Tatjana Maria, and then by doing something nobody saw coming: down 5-1 in the first set to Linda Nosková, the reigning Wimbledon champion and the world No. 7, McNally saved two set points, took the set in a tiebreak, and won twelve of the last fourteen games. Final score 7-6(5), 6-1. It was her second career top-ten win and her twenty-second tour-level win of the season, a career high.
And she is, above everything else, a doubles player. Nine WTA doubles titles. Three of them with Coco Gauff. A career-high ranking of No. 11 in doubles, against a career-high of No. 50 in singles. US Open doubles runner-up in 2020 and again in 2021.
What that means on court is hands. Volleys, angles, disguise, a willingness to take the ball early and change the shape of a rally. Eala's Toronto opener was against Alycia Parks, who serves 129 miles an hour and hits through you. McNally will not try to hit through anybody. She will try to make Eala play a different kind of point every time, and she has spent her whole career learning how.
| Alex Eala | Caty McNally | |
|---|---|---|
| Age | 21 | 24 |
| WTA singles ranking | No. 20 | No. 70 |
| Toronto seeding | No. 25 seed | Unseeded |
| 2026 record | 35-18 | 14-8 |
| Career-high singles | No. 20 (August 2026) | No. 50 (June 2026) |
| Career-high doubles | — | No. 11 |
| Path to this round | Bye, then d. Parks 6-1, 4-6, 6-2 | d. Maria, then d. Nosková 7-6(5), 6-1 |
| Head to head | First meeting | |
Eala is the better player and the deserved favorite. She has beaten six of the world's top ten this season. But the woman across the net just took out a Wimbledon champion from 5-1 down, and she does it with exactly the skill set that punishes tired legs.
What Time to Watch
The match is on Centre Court at Sobeys Stadium, last on the evening session. Coco Gauff and Maria Sakkari open that session first, which means the start time is a floor, not a promise. If Gauff and Sakkari go three sets, everything slides.
| Where you are | Start time (not before) |
|---|---|
| Toronto / U.S. East (EDT) | 8:10 p.m. — Friday, August 7 |
| California / U.S. West (PDT) | 5:10 p.m. — Friday, August 7 |
| Manila (PHT) | 8:10 a.m. — Saturday, August 8 |
For kababayan in the Philippines, that is Saturday breakfast. For those of us in California, it is right at dinner. For the Filipino community in the Greater Toronto Area — roughly 280,000 people, the largest Filipino population of any metro in Canada — it is a Friday night at home, and they filled that building for her on Wednesday.
Why I Cancelled Fubo
I have watched sports religiously since we landed in Chicago in 1976. Before that, in the Philippines. In an era before cable, when what you got was what the networks gave you, I watched cartoons and sports and then went outside and played until dark. Tennis I have followed across four eras: Borg, then McEnroe and Lendl, then Sampras and Agassi, then Federer and Nadal and Djokovic.
I stopped watching religiously in 2000, when I became a father. There was no time. I kept up with the Slams, the way you keep up with an old friend at Christmas.
Thursday I cancelled Fubo, and it was not really about money, though it saves some. It was about what I actually need. I do not have the hours to graze across nine hundred channels anymore. Highlights are free on YouTube. What I have time for is this website, the novel I am writing, and making sure my three kids understand where they came from. So I cancelled the everything package and bought the one channel that carries the thing I actually want to see.
There is a version of this that is just an old man's cord-cutting story. There is another version where a 21-year-old from Quezon City is the reason a 59-year-old Fil-Am in Vallejo restructured his television. I know which one it is.
As I write this, I have Iva Jovic on the Grandstand.
Who to Follow Now, If Eala Brought You Here
A lot of Filipinos are watching women's tennis for the first time because of Alex Eala. That is worth something, and it is worth more if it survives her losing a match. Here is the circle she has actually named as hers, so you know who to root for on the days she is not playing.
Zeynep Sönmez — Turkey
Eala's answer when asked to name a best friend, on tour or off. They have known each other since the junior and ITF circuits and have played each other three times. Eala leads that head to head. Sönmez is Turkey's most prominent woman in the game, which makes her a national-representation story in her own country the way Eala is in ours.
Eva Lys — Germany
Born in Kyiv, raised in Hamburg, and the most articulate of the group about how the friendships and the competition coexist. She has said plainly that when she plays Alex or Iva or Zeynep, she wants to win, and that they are in contact almost daily, sending each other memes about life on tour. Both things are true at once. That is the whole point.
Iva Jovic — United States
Eighteen years old, seeded 13th in Toronto, ranked No. 16 in the world. She beat Eala in the first round of the French Open this year and then posted afterward that some days she wished there could be two winners. She is on the Grandstand this afternoon against the qualifier Alina Korneeva. If you want the closest thing to a second Eala match this week, that is it.
Victoria Mboko — Canada
The defending National Bank Open champion, who won this tournament last summer at 18 years old and ranked No. 85. She is not in the draw this year. A knee injury kept her out of Wimbledon, has her sitting out her home tournament, and will keep her out of the US Open. Eala has played doubles with her. Follow her anyway — the comeback is coming, and it will be worth watching.
Leylah Fernandez — Canada
Filipino on her mother's side, the 2021 US Open finalist, and the last Canadian standing in either singles draw here. Eala beat her in Washington. Fernandez has never named her as a close friend and I am not going to invent one, but the heritage bond is real, and she is one of the players Filipino fans have always claimed.
Was I Wrong About the Doubles?
Partly. Let me argue against myself.
Seventy-six minutes is nothing. It is a warmup. Eala played Wednesday, played seventy-six minutes of doubles Thursday, and does not play singles again until Friday night — a full day off in between. If you were designing a light hitting session to keep a player sharp between matches, it would look a lot like Thursday night. Losing early may have been the most efficient outcome available: she got the court time, the crowd, the moment with Venus, and then she got her Friday back.
And there is the thing you cannot put on a schedule. Venus Williams is 46. She has fourteen Grand Slam doubles titles. Nobody knows how many of these windows are left, and Eala has said in three different press conferences that every hour she gets on court with her is something she treasures. If the cost of that was seventy-six minutes and an early exit, that is not an expensive education.
Here is what I still hold. In Washington she said Venus deserved a partner who could give everything physically, emotionally, mentally, and that right then she could only do that for singles. She was correct, she withdrew, and she won the tournament. A week later, with a heavier draw and less rest, the reasoning had not changed but the answer did. My worry was never the seventy-six minutes. It was the pattern — that a player this good and this in demand will be asked yes a hundred more times this year, and that the ability to say no is the rarest thing in her toolkit.
The US Open starts in three weeks. That is the tournament that decides how this season gets remembered. Everything between now and then is preparation for it, including tonight.
Go, Alex
A doubles specialist beat her Thursday. Another one is waiting Friday. I do not think that is an omen — I think it is a coincidence with good timing, which is most of what sport is.
She has won ten straight matches in which she took the opening set. She has beaten Świątek, Rybakina, Gauff, Paolini, Svitolina and Pegula this year alone. She is the first Filipina in the world's top 20 and she got there four days ago. If she takes the first set tonight, history says she is going to the round of 16.
I will be watching at 5:10, in my own living room, on the channel I bought yesterday for exactly this.
Go, Alex. And when this tournament is over — pahinga.
- Olympics.com — "Alexandra Eala/Venus Williams fall in women's doubles first round at Canadian Open" (August 6, 2026)
- Malaya Business Insight — "Eala-Williams duo bow out in National Bank Open doubles" (August 7, 2026)
- Inquirer Sports — "Alex Eala takes on Caty McNally in Canadian Open round of 32" (August 7, 2026)
- The Manila Times — "Eala takes on McNally in round of 32" (August 7, 2026)
- WTA — "Fresh off Washington title, Eala powers into Toronto third round" (August 6, 2026)
- WTA — "Eala, Venus Williams to team up for Toronto doubles" (August 4, 2026)
- National Bank Open / Tennis Canada — "Eala, Fernandez Join Favourites in Round Three" (August 6, 2026)
- Tennis365 — "Alex Eala: Who is her next opponent at Canadian Open?" (August 7, 2026)
- Tennis365 — "Alex Eala names four fellow WTA stars as she reveals 'really good friends' on tour" (March 2026)
- The Tennis Gazette — "Eva Lys speaks on her friendship with Alex Eala" (May 26, 2026)
- GMA News — "Alex Eala talks friendship with Iva Jovic after French Open defeat" (May 27, 2026)
- CBC News — "Canada's Leylah Fernandez moves into 3rd round of National Bank Open" (August 6, 2026)
- Formula 1 / McLaren Racing — Bianca Bustamante driver profile
- PinoyBuilt — "Alex Eala Wins in Toronto, Where 280,000 Kababayan Were Waiting" (August 6, 2026)
Help Us Become the #1 Filipino-American Media Platform in the U.S.
PinoyBuilt is built by the community, for the community. If this article meant something to you — if it made you proud, informed, or connected — we need your help to reach every kababayan out there.
💬 Drop a comment below — tell us where you are watching from, and what time it is where you are.
📲 Text this article to a friend, a tita, a teammate — anyone who needs to see this.
📣 Share it on your socials — every share brings us closer.
4.6 million Filipinos in the U.S. One platform telling our stories. Salamat, kababayan.
J.F. (Jonjo) left the Philippines at age nine, spending a lifetime bridging the gap between his Marikina roots and his Chicago/Vallejo upbringing. A proud Hogan Spartan from East Vallejo and resident of LA/SF, he founded PinoyBuilt not just as a digital archive, but as a cultural compass for his three children to navigate their heritage, language, and identity with Pinoy Pride.
Please comment below ↓
Comments
Post a Comment
Hi! Thank you for dropping by. Please leave us a comment. Sige na!