SOUTHEAST Asian pair Alex Eala and Janice Tjen are off to the quarterfinals of the WTA500 Mubadala Abu Dhabi after ousting Leylah Fernandez and Kristina Mladenovic, 7-5, 3-6, 10-6, to jumpstart their campaign early Wednesday morning (Manila time).
The first-time pairing of the Filipina and the Indonesian, WTA doubles Nos. 136 and 68, took an hour and 33 minutes to take down the higher-ranked duo.
Despite falling behind early in the opening set, 0-2, Eala and Tjen clawed back and traded holds all the way to 5-5 before closing it out.
READ: Alex Eala sweeps Sonmez to kick off Abu Dhabi campaign on a high
The second set swung the other way, with Fernandez and Mladenovic edging ahead from 2-all and stretching the gap, forcing a tiebreak where Eala and Tjen struck first, kept their noses in front, and powered through late exchanges to finish strong.
Eala and Tjen, the two highest-ranked players from their regions at Nos. 45 and 47, will now await their quarterfinal opponent between the Ukrainian duo of Lyudmyla Kichenok and Nadiia Kichenok and the Spanish-Chinese pairing of Cristina Bucsa and Shuai Zhang.
Meanwhile in their singles journeys, Tjen bowed out in the round of 16 after a loss to fifth seed Liudmila Samsonova of Russia, while Eala will play her second-round match against Belarusian Aliaksandra Sasnovich on Thursday night.
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