Tennis: From Joao Fonseca to Alexandra Eala – 10 rising tennis stars to watch out for at Roland-Garros 2025
It’s a thrilling time to be a tennis fan.
As the sport slides into its second major of 2025 on the storied red clay at Roland-Garros in Paris, a mix of veterans, established top stars and a crop of rising young talents make for storylines aplenty.
Filipina Alexandra Eala and Brazil’s Joao Fonseca – both still teenagers – have brought a whole new energy to the sport, too, with avid, passionate national fan bases that have turned the tennis court into more of a football pitch atmosphere at times in 2025.
What other stars-in-the-making do you need to know as the French Open gets underway at Stade Roland-Garros from Sunday (25 May)? We explore 10 of them below.
Roland-Garros 2025: Rising tennis stars to watch
Alexandra Eala (PHI) Age: 19 Rank: 69
For tennis superfans, Eala has been a name to know for a few years, having claimed the girls’ junior title at the US Open in 2022. Earlier this year, she made international headlines with her run to the Miami Open semi-finals, with straight-set wins over Grand Slam winners Jelena Ostapenko, Madison Keys and Iga Swiatek.
Eala plays a hard-hitting brand of tennis, but the left-hander also arrives at nearly every match with “home court advantage:” A sizeable, passionate Filipino fan base greeting her with support as she creates history for the Philippines as its most successful female tennis player ever already in her young career.
Also in Eala’s corner: Rafael Nadal, the recently retired tennis legend. Eala has trained at the Rafa Nadal Academy in Spain since the age of 12. Oh, and doubles with Coco Gauff? Eala and the U.S. star teamed up to make the quarter-finals earlier this month in Rome.
Joao Fonseca (BRA) Age: 18 Rank: 65
While Eala has brought the energetic fans from the Philippines, the 18-year-old Fonseca has done the same with the Brazilian contingent, who also seem to show up wherever he goes.
Fonseca was ranked outside the world’s top 200 just as recently as last July, but claimed the season-ending Next Gen ATP Finals title (a tournament for players 21 years old and under), before winning an ATP Challenger (one level below the main tour) to start 2025, and then claiming the biggest win of his career in the first round of the Australian Open: A three-set stunner over world No.9 Andrey Rublev.
Fonseca plays with lightning pace off his groundstrokes, too, particularly a lethal forehand side. He’s been lauded for his mental game at a young age, and was greeted with a hero’s welcome at the ATP event in Rio de Janeiro in February, where gymnastics legend Rebeca Andrade said hello.
