British No.1 Alfie Hewett and British No.3 Ben Bartram, who both hail from Norfolk, will play each other for the first time in international competition on Friday after five British wheelchair players progressed from Thursday’s singles quarter-finals at the Rothesay International Eastbourne. 

British No.5 Andrew Penney joins Hewett and Bartram in the last four of the men’s singles, while defending champion Andy Lapthorne lines up in the quad singles semi-finals and British No.1 Lucy Shuker returns to the women’s singles semi-finals.   

With a men’s wheelchair tennis draw featuring at Eastbourne for the first time this year, world No. 2 Hewett and Bartram both earned 6-2, 6-1 victories over their fellow Brits and respective doubles partners, Hewett beating Gordon Reid and Bartram defeating Dahnon Ward.

Hewett said: “It’s never easy to play your doubles partner in the first match, so it was bitter-sweet with that match up but in terms of my own performance I’m really happy with it. That was probably one of my best matches in the wind. You have to change things a little bit. Maybe you don’t take as many risks and try and be a bit safer and almost let the wind do the striking.”

After beating Ward in a grass court quarter-final for the second time, Bartram said: “I’m very happy with my performance. It’s been a longtime since I played on grass, and I’m pleased I was able to find my rhythm pretty quickly and get the job done today. It’s a great set up here and the facilities are really cool. It’s great to be part of the wider tournament here.”

Penney beat Asif Abbasi of Pakistan 6-0, 6-2 to book himself a men’s singles semi-final against Argentinian second seed Gustavo Fernandez.

World No.7 Lapthorne faces a tough quad singles semi-final against world No.1 Sam Schroder of the Netherlands after defeating Colombia’s Daniel Campaz 6-1, 6-2. Australian second seed Heath Davidson and Turkey’s Ahmet Kaplan will contest the other semi-final after Davidson and Kaplan both dropped just one game against British opponents Greg Slade and Cary Cox, respectively.

Shuker made a fine start to her women’s singles campaign, defeating the USA’s Maylee Phelps 6-3, 6-4 to set up a semi-final against Chinese second seed Zhu Zhenzhen, while Dutch top seed Jiske Griffioen will play American Dana Mathewson in the last four.

British No.2 Abbie Breakwell made a super start to her quarter-final against Mathewson, taking the world No.9 to a tie-break for the first time but she was unable to sustain her level in the second set.   

Thursday’s second of three days of wheelchair tennis action will see the start of the doubles draws, with 20-time Grand Slam champions Hewett and Reid beginning their quest for a 50th career title together.   

Thursday’s play from one wheelchair court is due to be live streamed via LTA channels.

‍For Rothesay International Eastbourne Wheelchair media enquiries please contact:

ltamediaeastbourne@lta.org.uk

Marshall.Thomas@lta.org.uk 

For additional LTA media enquiries please contact:

Media@lta.org.uk

Photo credit: Getty Images

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