Lewis Burton and Sean Thornley make the quarter finals of AEGON GB Pro-Series Wirral

Thursday, January 26, 2012
Lewis Burton and Sean Thornley make the quarter finals of AEGON GB Pro-Series Wirral

Dan Cox, Lewis Burton, Alex Ward, David Rice, and Sean Thornley have all made it through to the quarter-finals of the AEGON GB Pro-Series Wirral.

In the opening round of play on Wednesday 22 year old Thornley secured a break in each set to beat compatriot Richard Bloomfield 6-4, 6-4 in one hour 45 minutes after withstanding break points when serving at 2-3 in both sets.

Thornley's doubles partner Rice also claimed victory on Wednesday beating third seed Josh Goodall 7-6(4), 6-1 after recovering from a break down at 3-2 in the first set.

Following on from Thornley on Court Two was fellow Kent player Lewis Burton, who stormed through the first 6-1, against Italian Emanuele Molina.

The second set was a much closer affair with Burton impressively saving a set point when serve-volleying on a second serve hitting a winning first volley in the process.

The 19 year old Wimbledon 2010 junior doubles runner-up went on to hold and then romp through the tie-break 7-0 for a 6-1, 7-6(0) passage into the last eight.

Dan Cox followed up on his victory over Dan Evans with a 7-5, 6-1 victory over Oliver Hudson, despite losing the opening three games of the match, whilst sixth seed Alex Ward beat local favourite Harry Meehan 6-4, 6-2 to complete the quintet of British players into the last eight.

Like Meehan, Scott Whitbread gained his first world ranking points the previous day, but was unable to find a way past the experienced Czech Jan Minar. Andy Fitzpatrick put up a good fight winning the second set 6-4 against second seed Yannick Mertens before the Belgian won in three sets, whilst Thursday's quarter-final line up is completed by top seed Jerzy Janowicz who overcame Finn Juho Paukku also in three sets.

Thursday sees Janowicz play Cox, Burton play Minar, Ward play Rice, and Thornley play Mertens with 5 of the 8 players remaining un-seeded.

Conversely all four seeds have made it through to the doubles semi-finals with top seeds David Rice and Sean Thornley playing fourth seeds Milan Pokrajac and Karan Rastogi whilst second seeds Lewis Burton and Chris Eaton face third seeds Timo Nieminen and Juho Paukku.

Burton and Eaton survived a 13-11 match tie-break when beating Harry Meehan and Stefan Sterland-Markovic 6-4, 5-7, [13-11].

Play starts 10.00am on Thursday at rhe Wirral Tennis & Leisure Centre, with entry free for spectators.

 
 

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