Evans progresses but Ward and Baker exit

Britain’s Davis Cup hero Dan Evans powered into the second round of the AEGON Championships at Queen’s at the expense of Guido Pella.
Great Britain's Daniel Evans in actionGreat Britain's Daniel Evans in action
Great Britain's Daniel Evans in action

Evans, 23, beat Dmitry Tursunov back in April as Britain came from 2-0 down to beat Russia 3-2 in their Davis Cup match and his good form continued as he dispatched Pella, winning 6-3 6-1 in the opening match on centre court.

The British No 7 required attention from the trainer in just the second game of the match after falling awkwardly, but the short lay-off did not affect his game.

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British wildcard James Ward, however, spurned several chances to record a first-round victory over Ivan Dogic, serving for the match before eventually succumbing to the Croatian.

Ward took a close opening set on a tie-break and had two match points during the second set, as well as serving for the match during the decisive third.

But Dogic showed why he is inside the top 50 players in the world and performed doggedly to secure a 6-7 (8-10) 7-6 (7-3) 7-6 (7-2) victory in a match that lasted almost three hours.

British qualifier Jamie Baker lost in straight sets to ninth seed Benoit Paire, with the Frenchman recording a 7-5 6-2 victory.

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British No 5 Anne Keothavong bowed out of the AEGON Classic in the first round in Birmingham with a 5-7 2-6 defeat to American qualifier Alison Riske.

Keothavong, handed a wild card for the event, was broken six times in the course of the 92-minute match as she slipped to defeat against an opponent ranked 44 places higher in the current world rankings.

There was further misery for the British fans in the evening session as Melanie South was beaten 4-6 2-6 by Magdalena Rybarikova.

Seeds Su-Wei Hsieh and Ayumi Morita had been early casualties on the opening day as they were beaten by Jamie Hampton and Alison Van Uytvanck respectively.

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Hampton eased past 10th seed Hsieh 6-2 6-3 while Belgium’s Van Uytvanck beat 11th seeded Morita of Japan 6-4 6-0.

There were no such problems for former Wimbledon semi-finalist Tsvetana Pironkova who beat Lauren Davis of the United States 6-2 6-1.

Other early winners included Croatian veteran Mirjana Lucic-Baroni, Croatian qualifier Ajla Tomljanovic, American Madison Keys and Vesna Dolonc of Serbia.

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