A busy week on the WTA 125 circuit saw Alexandra Eala, Maja Chwalinska and Veronika Erjavec crowned champions in Guadalajara, Montreux and Changsha respectively.
Eala, fresh from becoming the first Filipina to win a Grand Slam main-draw match at the US Open, carried her momentum on to the hard courts of Guadalajara, Mexico, where she took a last-minute wild card and was the No. 2 seed. It paid off, as the 20-year-old continued to make history for her country by lifting the first WTA 125 trophy of her career.
In New York, Eala had pulled off one of the most thrilling comebacks of the tournament as she upset Clara Tauson from 5-1 down in the third set, saving a match point along the way. Her Guadalajara title run showed off her battling skills, too. In the second round, she came through a 3-hour, 10-minute barnburner — split over two days — to defeat American qualifier Varvara Lepchenko 6-7(3), 7-6(3), 6-3. In the quarterfinals, she came from 5-3 down in the first set, saving two set points, to quell Italy’s Nicole Fossa Huergo 7-6(2), 6-2.
In the final, Eala faced Panna Udvardy, who had defeated her in the second round of the Oeiras WTA 125 in April — Eala’s first tournament after her breakthrough run to the Miami semifinals. For a set, the Hungarian seemed on the way to reprising that result before Eala gradually turned the match in her favor to win 1-6, 7-5, 6-3. Most impressive was Eala’s steel in the second set, in which she missed her first six set points at 5-3 up before Udvardy levelled at 5-5. However, the youngster held firm to snatch the last two games, sealing her seventh set point on the Udvardy serve.
Udvardy enjoyed wins over wild card Nikola Bartunkova 7-6(7), 6-2 in the second round and No. 4 seed Francesca Jones 6-4, 4-6, 6-3 in the quarterfinals. Former No. 84 Kayla Day, who returned to action in April following a six-month injury layoff, reached the semifinals with a 7-5, 6-2 quarterfinal upset of No. 3 seed Emiliana Arango.
Maria Kozyreva and Iryna Shymanovich upset No. 1 seeds Irina Khromacheva and Kamilla Rakhimova 6-3, 6-4 in the doubles final to claim their third WTA 125 title together, following Bari and Valencia in June.
Chwalinska claims second career WTA 125 title
Chwalinska didn’t get off to the most promising of starts on the clay of the Montreux Nestlé Open, Switzerland. She lost her first set of the tournament 6-0 to home hope and No. 1 seed Jil Teichmann, who had defeated her in the second round of Iasi just over a month previously.
But the 23-year-old Pole battled to a 0-6, 6-4, 6-1 upset of Teichmann, her third Top 100 win of 2025 — and enjoyed a smooth passage to the title from there. Chwalinska conceded just 16 games in her last four matches, defeating No. 8 seed Arantxa Rus 6-4, 6-0 in the quarterfinals and No. 5 seed Darja Semenistaja 6-1, 6-2 in a 1-hour, 20-minute final. She added a second WTA 125 trophy to her collection, following Florianopolis last December.
Elsewhere, Ukraine’s Oleksandra Oliynykova continued her 2025 surge by reaching her first WTA 125 semifinal. The 24-year-old upset No. 2 seed Mayar Sherif in the first round and was only stopped 7-6(5), 6-7(3), 6-4 by Semenistaja in a 3-hour, 27-minute semifinal. Oliynykova’s season record is now 35-14.
Oksana Selekhmeteva and Simona Waltert took the doubles title, defeating Rus and Anca Todoni 6-4, 6-1 in the final. It was a first WTA 125 doubles title for Selekhmeteva and a fourth for Waltert (who was also the 2021 Lausanne doubles champion with Susan Bandecchi at tour level).
Erjavec wins first career WTA 125 title
Until last week, Erjavec’s standout moments in a career-best season had been at the Grand Slams. The 25-year-old Slovenian’s record at the majors this year is 11-4 — she qualified for the Australian Open and Wimbledon, upsetting Marta Kostyuk in the main draw at the latter for her first tour-level victory, and made the final qualifying round at Roland Garros and the US Open. But until she landed at the clay-court Changsha Open, her record in non-Slam tournaments in 2025 was just 12-15.
No. 3 seed Erjavec won a pair of rollercoaster matches 6-0, 2-6, 7-6(7) over No. 5 seed Lanlana Tararudee in the quarterfinals and qualifier Ekaterina Reyngold 0-6, 7-6(3), 6-3 in the semifinals, advancing to her second career WTA 125 final following Cali last November. There, she raced past No. 8 seed Maria Timofeeva 6-1, 6-2 to claim the title.
Timofeeva, who won the 2023 Budapest title in her first ever WTA main draw and made the Australian Open fourth round the following year, continued to rebuild her ranking, which had slumped to No. 278 in June. The 21-year-old triumphed 5-7, 7-5, 6-3 over No. 1 seed Maria Lourdes Carle in a 3-hour, 29-minute quarterfinal.
No. 4 seeds Eudice Chong and Liang En-Shuo claimed the doubles title with a 7-5, 6-3 defeat of Li Yu-Yun and Yao Xinxin in the final. It was a second WTA 125 doubles crown for Chinese Taipei’s Liang (following Charleston 2021 with Rebecca Marino) and a first for Hong Kong’s Chong.