Andrew Lapthorne and John Parfitt will contest both the quad singles quarter-finals and quad doubles semi-finals during Friday's fourth day of action at the Japan Open Wheelchair Tennis Championships in Iizuka after winning their opening doubles match on Thursday without dropping game.
After a first round bye the British second seeds defeated Japan's Sadahiro Kimura and Takahiro Koga 6-0, 6-0 to set up an enthralling last four match against third seeds Noam Gershony of Israel and Sweden's Anders Hard.
Hard had been a potential singles quarter-final opponent for Parfitt, but the Swedish third seed was upset by Japan's Shinichi Hirata in three close sets on Thursday morning in the last remaining quad singles second round match. Parfitt is now scheduled to take on Hirata on Friday morning.
Both Lapthorne and Parfitt will be bidding to book a place in the first ITF Super Series singles semi-finals of their respective careers on Friday, with second seed Lapthorne also potentially on course for a top five quad singles world ranking for the first time if he can overcome Malaysia's Azman Hasan in his quarter-final.
The Japan Open is the second tournament on the 2011 NEC Wheelchair Tennis Tour to have Super Series status, which makes it one of the five most important wheelchair tennis events outside of the Grand Slams.
Share