Eala brushes off ankle injury scare in Canadian Open

TORONTO, ONTARIO – AUGUST 07: Alexandra Eala of the Philippines serves to Caty McNally of the United States during day six of the National Bank Open Presented by Rogers at Sobeys Stadium on August 07, 2026 in Toronto, Ontario.

Matthew Stockman / Getty Images / AFP

MANILA, Philippines — “No serious problems.”

An injury may have hampered her three-set match against Caty McNally, but Alex Eala’s ankle is good to go.

Eala grinded out a 6-3, 5-7, 6-4 victory over the American Saturday morning (Manila time) to advance in the Canadian Open’s Round of 16.

During the second set of the match, the Filipina had to have her right ankle taped up as she was visibly affected by an injury.

While she opted to eventually remove her ankle tape, she was able to finish the match and grab the win after two hours and 39 minutes.

After the match, she acknowledged that she got hurt during the second set after landing wrong following a forehand hit.

“Yeah, I kind of rolled my ankle in that second set. I hit the forehand and I landed kind of wrong. I called the physio, and I think I was a little… I was like, oh, I don't know what happened because it happened so fast,” the World No. 20 tennister said.

“But luckily, there's nothing wrong with it. And there were no serious problems. But, I mean, yeah, today was physically, it pushed me a lot,” she added.

The pride of the Philippines bared that she is “tired as one can be at this stage,” but reiterated that it is part of sports.

“Yeah, I needed to push a lot. I am as tired as one can be at this stage. You can imagine a lot of matches, but that's the job. I'm ready. I'm excited for another match. I'm going to do my best to recover and start again from zero,” she said.

“And I have a lot of matches in the bag. But that goes for good and bad. And I think this is also a learning process. We're athletes, so that's kind of physical. It's like a huge part of our job,” she added.

“So I think I have a great team who's going to help me recover. And I have high hopes for the rest of the tournament.”

Up next for Eala is Belinda Bencic, who also had a three-set war against Taylor Townsend, 6(5)-7, 7-6(4), 6-4.

Bencic needed three hours and 24 minutes to grab the win.

“Oh, super excited. It's going to be the first time that I'm facing her. And, of course, Belinda is… I mean, she has accomplished so much in tennis. And, of course, I remember watching her win the Olympic medal,” she said.

“I'm really excited to be on court again.”

Their match is scheduled for Monday.