FILIPINO tennis ace Alex Eala stayed at No. 18 in the latest official WTA rankings following the conclusion of the US Open on Monday.
Reaching the third round of the final major of the year, Eala holds a total of 2,276 ranking points in the leaderboard.
Eala ended her campaign with a 5-7, 6-3, 5-7 loss to world No. 16 Iva Jovic in the third round.
The 21-year-old will next compete at the WTA 500 Singapore Open slated from Sept. 21 to 27.
Eala will then skip the China Open in a bid to win the gold medal at the Asian Games tennis play from Sept. 27 to Oct. 3.
Newly-minted US Open champ Elena Rybakina emerged as the new No. 1 player in the rankings with 9,901 points after spending 24 weeks (since March 2026) as the No. 2 player.
Rybakina, whom Eala already faced twice and defeated once, secured the top spot after advancing to the US Open semifinals.
She became the first player, male or female, from Kazakhstan to claim the world’s No. 1 spot, ending Aryna Sabalenka’s 99 consecutive week reign (since Oct. 2024).
Sabalenka, who lost her title to Rybakina in the US Open final, fell to No. 2 with 7,875 points.
Jessica Pegula (7,265), Coco Gauff (7,244), Mirra Andreeva (5,743), and Linda Noskova (5,328) stayed in the top 3 to 6 spots.
Elina Svitolina jumped two places to reach No. 7 with 4,809 points followed by Karolina Muchova (4,683) and Iga Swiatek (4,619).
Marta Kostyuk achieved a new career-high rank with 3,980 points to round out the top 10 players.
Meanwhile, Eala’s grand homecoming match, “Alex Eala Live - Game, Set Celebrate,” at the Philippine Arena on December 8 will be star-studded.
Manny Pacquiao, the world’s only 8-division boxing champ, along with actors Piolo Pascual and Anne Curtis, headline the “Celebrity Match” lineup, as Tatler, the event organizer, revealed in an Instagram post Monday.
Julia Barreto, Donny Pangilinan, and Andrea Brillantes complete the celebrity lineup.
Tatler did not specify the matchups between the celebrities, yet.
World No. 18 Eala faces No. 51 Janice Tjen of Indonesia in a battle between Southeast Asia’s top tennis players.
