MANILA, Philippines — Filipino tennis ace Alexandra "Alex" Eala and her close pal Zeynep Sonmez of Turkey face doubles specialists Chan Hao-ching and Fanny Stollar in the first round of the Madrid Open in Spain on Thursday.
At press time, no specific time had been set for the round of 32 doubles match, but it's likely evening or late night in Manila.
Eala and Sonmez were playing their singles opening matches on Wednesday, with the former facing Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova and the latter taking on Carlota Martinez Cirez.
The 20-year-old Eala and the 23-year-old Sönmez received wildcard entries in this WTA 1000 doubles tournament.
The Philippine bet is ranked No. 101 while the Turkey pride is 406 in doubles, where their career-high ranks are No. 99 and 382, respectively.
The Filipino-Turkish duo ranks well below the Taiwanese-Hungarian tandem of Chan and Stollar, who are ranked No. 27 and No. 38, respectively.
