There’s a silver lining in Alex Eala’s early exit in the Australian Open.

With Eala no longer in contention in the women’s singles event, there’s a very good chance to her to come home and compete in the Philippine Women’s Open (PWO) — a prestigious Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) 125 event that will be held at the Rizal Memorial Tennis Center next Monday.

The 20-year-old Eala tried but couldn’t contain the heavy serves of Alycia Parks of the United States down the stretch, sending her to a heartbreaking 6-0, 3-6, 2-6 loss in the opening round of the season-opening Grand Slam event on Monday at Court 6 of Melbourne Park.

Eala said despite the loss, she remains grateful for the lessons she gained from her first ever main draw appearance in the Australian Open.

“I’m still young, so learning how to deal with all of this attention, but then at the same time being grateful,” Eala said after her loss to the 99th-ranked Parks.

Although disappointed, Eala said just being at the first major of the year was significant for her nation.

“I guess this is one of the moments that I can reflect on what this means for Philippine tennis,” she said.

“I’m the only Filipina in the draw this year. I’m the only Filipina that’s ever been in the draw, I think.

“So, there are positives to take away.”

Still, it was a “good problem” for Eala as she will bank in P5.9 million for making it to the main draw while getting a good chance to see action in the PWO — the biggest tennis event that is being organized by the Philippine Sports Commission and Philippine Lawn Tennis Association.

The only roadblock in her WPO stint is her doubles event assignment in which she will join forces with Ingrid Martins of Brazil, who is a known doubles specialist with a career-best ranking of No. 47 in doubles event.

Eala and Martins, who are projected to make a deep run will launch their bid against the tandem of Shuko Aoyama of Japan and world No. 50 Magda Linette of Poland in the Round of 64 on Tuesday at Court 12 of the same venue in downtown Melbourne.

Should the Eala-Martins duo prevail, they will take on the winner between the sixth seed pair of Asia Muhammad of the United States and Erin Ratliffe of New Zealand and Linda Noskova of the Czech Republic and Rebecca Sramkova of Slovakia in the Round of 64.

However, if Eala makes yet another early exit, she will surely book the flight home and play in front of her countrymen in the PWO for valuable ranking points.

Eala will be taking familiar and strong opponents as she defends home court.

Stars like No. 38 Tatjana Maria of Germany, No. 64 Solana Sierra of Argentina, No. 72 Donna Vekic of Croatia, No. 85 Lulu Sun of New Zealand and No. 87 Moyuka Uchijima of Japan will see action in the inaugural event that was organized to bring Eala closer to local fans while boosting the country’s sports tourism program.

Aside from Eala, other local players who will compete in the PWO are rising stars Tennielle Madis and college star Kaye Emana of University of Santo Tomas.