Kyle Brassington might not have been playing on his favourite surface but he still made finals in successive weeks on clay in the AEGON British Tour.

The 23-year-old from Ilkley was second seed at his Leeds Metropolitan University base, losing 6-2, 6-3 to No 1 seed Toby Martin, and top seed the next week at Newcastle, where he went down 7-6 (7-3), 6-3 to fifth seed Daniel McGrath.

“It would have been nice to have won both finals,” said Brassington, “but it wasn’t a bad fortnight considering that I haven’t practised or played on clay for a while.”

Not feeling the pressure of playing at home, he showed his rustiness on the surface, however, in dropping the middle set in his second-round match at Leeds against James Lake before triumphing 6-3, 2-6, 6-3.

Brassington then enjoyed 6-4, 6-3 victories over Daniel Sinclair and Robert Morgan before meeting world No 1213 Martin, who was a wild card.

Second-seeded Brassington, ranked 1381 in the world, said: “It is different playing on clay to hard courts as the surface is more uneven and you can slide.

“It takes a couple of matches to get used to it and I dropped the middle set against James when I didn’t play my best. I tried to get to the net too much and it didn’t really work.”

“Dan is a part-time coach at Thongsbridge, plays with our squad a bit at Leeds Met and is pushing for a place in the Yorkshire team.

“I had to knuckle down and concentrate to win that one, and I played Robert the same day.

“He had had a good win in the morning over the fourth seed Mathew James and it had taken a lot out of him. Robert prefers hard courts like me and has a big serve.”

Brassington added: “The final was closer than the score suggests but I had to use the racquet of one of the coaches who was watching the match as I broke strings in three of my own during the match, including two in the knock-up!”

There was the possibility of an all-Ilkley clash in the second round at Newcastle but qualifier James Ickringill lost 6-3, 7-5 in the first round to Joshua Bexon.

“It would have been nice to have played James as I know him from Ilkley and he is improving his game at Stirling University,” said Brassington.

“The clay at Newcastle was slower and stickier than Leeds due to rain.”

Brassington had a match point against Bexon at 6-5 in the second set tie-break before winning 6-3, 6-7 (6-8), 6-1, and followed that with a 7-6 (7-4), 6-0 victory over John Thompson and a 6-1, 6-3 triumph over third seed Rogan Egerton before losing to McGrath.

“I recovered well to beat Joshua,” said the top seed, “and then beat John and Rogan by playing good clay-court tennis.

“The final was frustrating as I broke him once in the first set but must have had 15 to 17 break points otherwise that I didn’t take but he played pretty well.”

Brassington is now playing French League tennis over five weekends for a club in Clermont Ferrand in Division Three.

“I played for a club in Paris last year but I am now playing about 90 minutes from Lyon and trying to get the Clermont Ferrand club back into Division Two,” explained Brassington.

“I get 650 euros for each Sunday I play, which involves a singles and a doubles, and hopefully the money I earn will enable me to play some ITF Futures tournament in Britain and in Western Europe later this summer.

“But I will be back at Ilkley to play in both the Futures and the British Tour.”