By Kristel Satumbaga
Top junior netter Alex Eala and Indonesian Priska Madelyn Nugroho made history Friday by winning the Australian Open Junior Championships girls doubles title in Melbourne.
Mixing their shots pretty well, the duo trounced Slovenia’s Ziva Falkner and Great Britain’s Matilda Mutavdzic, 6-1, 6-2, in a win that caught the fancy of many Grand Slam enthusiasts.
Eala and Nugroho were on fire they needed just 49 minutes in dispatching their rivals.
They won four break points out of nine and had 18 winners.
The feat made Eala, 14, the second Filipino to win a Grand Slam title after former top junior player Francis Casey Alcantara.
Alcantara captured the boys doubles crown during the 2009 Australian Open Junior Championships with Taiwanese partner Hsieh Cheng-peng.
The win also made up for Eala’s third-round exit in the girl’s singles.
Eala and Nugroho were so focused and determined they just dropped just four sets throughout the tournament including their opening-round victory over Elina Avenesyan of Russia and Ukraine’s Liubov Kostenko, 7-5, 4-6, 10-8.
They were also pushed to three sets in the second round before prevailing over Julie Belgraver of France and Slovenia’s Pia Lovric, 6-2, 4-6, 11-9.
In the quarters, they survived a tough first set before posting a France 7-6 (2), 6-2 win over seventh seed Aubane Droguet and Selena Janicijevic of France.
They hinted of good things to come when they stunned top seed Kamilla Bartone of Latvia and Linda Fruhvirtova of Czech Republic, 1-6, 7-5, 10-8, in the semis.
Both Eala and Nugroho’s International Tennis Federation junior rankings are expected to shot up from Nos. 9 and 27, respectively