HOME interest in the Lexus British Tour tournament at Ilkley Lawn Tennis & Squash Club is over for another year.

JB Pickard was defeated 4-3 (1), 4-1 by lucky loser Tobey Lock in the first round of the men’s singles, while Alice Brook fell 4-1, 4-2 to sixth seed Ellie Blackford in the second round of the women’s singles.

Pickard, 20, who is returning to Samford University in the United States later this month to start the third year of four of an accountancy course, said of his indoor clash: “It was a tight first set, he was playing very well and the courts were quite quick so I was struggling with his pace a bit.

“In the second set, I didn’t start quickly and he carried the momentum forward in the second set that he had gained in the first, although I picked it up a bit towards the end of the set.”

Pickard then confessed: “I probably went into the tournament a little bit undercooked due to an accountancy internship so I haven’t been able to get down here to play as much as I would like.”

Brook revealed: “I hurt my abs in my first round so it made it difficult on serve and she wasn’t putting much pace on the ball and wasn’t making mistakes and I was hitting it big.”

When Brook got it right, she looked impressive, but fellow 17-year-old Blackford drew enough errors from the Ilkley Grammar School pupil to go through.

However, there is still plenty of Yorkshire interest in both the men’s and women’s singles.

Leeds Beckett University squad member Vassily Psaltopoulos, who stands 6ft 8in, defeated 18-year-old Scott Hillerby from Moortown 4-2, 4-3, and the big-serving qualifier now faces Matthew Rutter, who beat third seed Callum Todd 4-2, 1-4, 10-3.

Also through to the last 16 is fourth seed Jordan Reed-Thomas, from Headingley, who won a marathon first-set tie-break 13-11 against Preston’s Ben Davies on the way to a 4-3, 4-1 victory that gave him a second-round match against qualifier Euan Mackenzie.

Out, however, are qualifiers Harry Abel, from Harrogate, beaten 4-1, 4-0 by top seed Patrick Foley, and Joe Mazingham, from Beverley, defeated 4-1, 4-3 (11) by Matthew Nice, who now plays Foley.

Others to bite the dust are qualifier Sebastian Harrison from Sheffield, who fell 3-4 (1), 4-3 (6), 10-7 to William Burridge; lucky loser Tom Cowdy, from Roundhay, beaten 4-1, 4-1 by in-form fifth seed Dan Bennett; and Leeds Beckett University’s assistant coach Paul Johnson, who was a little tentative on the big points in a 1-4, 4-3 (3), 10-6 defeat to Glaswegian Jack Deveney.

The women’s singles are though to the last eight, and still pitching is Sheffield’s Sarah Copley, who squeezed past north-easterner Halle Pringle 1-4, 4-2, 10-8 in a very uneven encounter.

The 16-year-old Abbeydale member now plays Daisy Carpenter, but among those missing out is Roundhay’s Eleanore Lake, 22, who lost 4-1, 4-1 to fifth seed Teodora Prisadnikova, 15, from Newcastle.

All of the British Tour matches, a Grade Two event, were played indoors for a fourth successive day, and referee Peter Grimsdale confirmed that the rest of that tournament will also be played indoors due to the poor weather forecast today[Friday] and tomorrow.

What little grass-court action there has been was in the Grade Three Ilkley Open, which is running alongside the British Tour and also concludes tomorrow[Saturday].