{"id":13564,"date":"2026-05-07T03:25:23","date_gmt":"2026-05-07T03:25:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/italy\/13564\/"},"modified":"2026-05-07T03:25:23","modified_gmt":"2026-05-07T03:25:23","slug":"italian-open-2026-alexandra-eala-tops-magdalena-frech-for-1st-round-win","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/italy\/13564\/","title":{"rendered":"Italian Open 2026: Alexandra Eala Tops Magdalena Fr\u0119ch for 1st Round Win"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Alexandra Eala\u00a0battled through a tough <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/tennis\/story\/_\/id\/48692367\/alex-eala-rallies-magdalena-frech-gritty-italian-open-opener\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">opening-round test<\/a> on Wednesday, rallying past\u00a0Magdalena Fr\u0119ch\u00a0to advance to the Round of 64 at the 2026 Italian Open.<\/p>\n<p>Eala secured the 6-0, 3-6, 6-4 win in two hours and seven minutes, giving the 20-year-old Filipina her first career <a href=\"https:\/\/justwomenssports.com\/reads\/coco-gauff-italian-open-2026-draw\/\" type=\"link\" id=\"https:\/\/justwomenssports.com\/reads\/coco-gauff-italian-open-2026-draw\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Rome Open<\/a> victory.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m really proud of myself because there were so many moments, especially in the third set, where she could&#8217;ve gone really far,&#8221; Eala said of her Round of 128 opponent.<\/p>\n<p>Despite the competition, the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wtatennis.com\/rankings\/singles\" type=\"link\" id=\"https:\/\/www.wtatennis.com\/rankings\/singles\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">world No. 42<\/a> looked firmly in control early in the match.<\/p>\n<p>Eala dictated rallies from the baseline, winning 67% of her first-serve points while remaining flawless behind her second serve. She subsequently shut out Fr\u0119ch 6-0 in the opening set.<\/p>\n<p>However, momentum shifted in the second.<\/p>\n<p>The Polish player settled into longer rallies, forcing a deciding set after taking advantage of a dip in Eala\u2019s form.<\/p>\n<p>Fr\u0119ch managed to grab a 3-1 lead in the third before Eala responded.<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/justwomenssports.com\/reads\/alexandra-eala-philippine-womens-open-debut-win\/\" type=\"link\" id=\"https:\/\/justwomenssports.com\/reads\/alexandra-eala-philippine-womens-open-debut-win\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">20-year-old<\/a> broke back to level the set at 3-3, held for a 4-3 advantage, then fought off a break point in a crucial ninth game to move ahead 5-4. From there, Eala broke Fr\u0119ch one final time to close out the victory.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I think I&#8217;ve come a long way from last year,&#8221; Eala said. &#8220;My team and I have really been working the past few weeks, and I think that we&#8217;ve been able to put out just some things that we&#8217;ve been working on in competition.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Where to Watch Alexandra Eala at the 2026 Italian Open<\/p>\n<p>Eala next faces <a href=\"https:\/\/justwomenssports.com\/reads\/oleksandra-oliynykova-transylvania-open-semi-finals-wang-xinyu-2026\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Wang Xinyu<\/a> in the Round of 64, after the No. 31 seed received a first-round bye. Xinyu previously defeated Eala in the Auckland semifinals earlier this year.<\/p>\n<p>The Italian Open continues through May 17th, live on the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.tennischannel.com\/en-us\/page\/home\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Tennis Channel<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Alexandra Eala\u00a0battled through a tough opening-round test on Wednesday, rallying past\u00a0Magdalena Fr\u0119ch\u00a0to advance to the Round of 64&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":13565,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[9739,10011,5,10012,10013,9741],"class_list":{"0":"post-13564","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-italy","8":"tag-2026-italian-open","9":"tag-alexandra-eala","10":"tag-italy","11":"tag-magdalena-frech","12":"tag-wang-xinyu","13":"tag-wta-1000"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/italy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/italy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/italy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/italy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/italy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13564"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/italy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13564\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/italy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/italy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/italy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/italy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}