Broady falls agonisingly short of setting up Watson duel

Watson, newly installed inside the world’s top 100 and with a Wimbledon wild card in the bag, was too strong for Japan’s world No 133 Misaki Doi and triumphed 6-2 6-4.

It looked like Broady was going to set up an all-British clash in round three as she rallied from the brink of defeat to hold a 3-0 lead in the final set against China’s world No 20 Shuai Peng.

Broady had overcome a 4-1 deficit in the second set tie-break to force the decider and looked like she was going to continue her fine run when she made a blazing start to the third set.

But big-serving Broady, ranked 231, was broken back at a crucial moment and the Chinese player banked on her experience to see her through for a 6-2 6-7 (7-5) 7-6 (7-2) win.

Broady will take consolation from her superb first-round win over emerging French player Caroline Garcia plus the knowledge that, like Watson, she has a guaranteed place in the Wimbledon first round.

Second seed and former world No 1 Ana Ivanovic made short work of Georgia’s Anna Tatishvili, requiring just 44 minutes to claim a 6-1 6-0 win and move into the third round.

Nor were there any problems for fourth seed Daniela Hantuchova, who brushed aside Romania’s Sorana Cirstea 6-0 6-3 on a day which saw a number of notable seeds knocked out.

Sixth-seeded Russian Ekaterina Makarova went out 4-6 6-3 4-6 to Austria’s Tamara Paszek, 11th seed Yaroslava Shvedova lost 6-7 (7-9) 5-7 to Marina Erakovic, and ninth seed Ayumi Morita was also beaten.

n Second seed Tomas Berdych booked his place in the quarter-finals of the Gerry Weber Open in Halle with a battling straight-sets win over fellow Czech Jan Hernych.

Berdych saved three match points en route to a first-round victory over Ruben Bemelmans on Tuesday and again had to dig deep 24 hours later as he saw off Hernych 6-3 7-6 (9/7).

Last year’s Wimbledon runner-up will face fifth seed Viktor Troicki in the last eight after the Serbian posted a routine 6-3 6-1 win over Russia’s Igor Andreev.

Eighth seed Milos Raonic of Canada sent down 14 aces as he booked his place in the quarters with a 7-6 (7/2) 6-3 triumph over Germany’s Tobias Kamke, while local favourite Philipp Petzschner also progressed with a 6-2 6-4 win over Spain’s Daniel Gimeno-Traver.