British number 4, Tara Moore, produced a highly impressive display when she dismissed 7th seeded Dutch girl Richel Hogenkamp in Sunderland on Wednesday.
The 21 year carried on from where she left off when winning the title in Glasgow last week, and was totally dominant in her 6-3, 6-0 1st round win.
British number 7 seed Jade Windley joined her compatriot in round 2. Windley, who used to train in Sunderland was leading top seed, and British number 2, Jo Konta 6-3, 2-1, when Konta had to retire. With four seeds dropping at the first hurdle, the women’s singles draw has really opened up, and both Moore and Windley will be looking to take advantage.
The men’s singles has now reached the quarter-final stage, with three Brits into the last 8. After his scare on day 1, top seed Dan Cox had a relatively straight forward encounter defeating Frenchman Enzo Couacaud 7-5, 6-4, whilst fellow Team Gosling player David Rice (seeded 5) set up a potential semi-final match against Cox when beating Tom Farquharson 6-2, 6-1.
Defending champion Dan Smethurst kept his winning Sunderland streak going coming through both his singles & doubles matches on Wednesday, to set up a quarter-final clash against qualifier Sander Arends, who received a walk over against 2nd seed Laurynas Grigelis.
Play starts Thursday at 10.00am with free entry to spectators and live scoring on www.lta.org.uk/aegongbpro-series