HAVING dipped his toes into the waters of the ATP Challenger Tour, Jonny O'Mara cannot wait for his next opportunity.

The 21-year-old Keighley-born Scot qualified for the AEGON Surbiton Trophy last week without dropping a set, and then beat China's Zhe Li 6-2, 6-4 in the first-round proper before losing 6-3, 6-2 to fourth seed Bjorn Fratangelo (United States).

This week, the grass-court circus has moved north for the AEGON Ilkley Trophy and, for the second successive match, Arbroath-based O'Mara has met a member of the world's top 100.

Given a wild card, O'Mara lost 7-6 (7-5), 6-2 earlier today to top seed Jordan Thompson of Australia.

However, the Scot, who was ranked 701 before his exploits at Surbiton, where he beat four players with significantly higher rankings - Jeevan Neduncheziyan (India) is 568, Britons Luke Bambridge and Joshua Milton are 517 and 440 and Li is 247 - reckons he is not too far away from players of the standard of Fratangelo, who was 99 in the world when he faced O'Mara, and Thompson, who heads the Ilkley field at 90.

O'Mara, whose ranking has jumped 88 places since last week, said: "I just love playing on grass. It is so much fun, and a lot of how you play is down to hand-eye skills, and I am good at that.

"I haven't worked out my schedule after Ilkley but I would like my future to be at Challenger level rather than Futures level, and I feel I am capable of that.

"I had a series of niggling injuries but I have been injury free for the last six to seven months."

Elsewhere, there was a defeat for fellow Briton Lloyd Glasspool at the same stage, but he took a set off impressive qualifier Michal Przysiezny of Poland 6-7 (5-7), 6-3, 6-3.

However, Brydan Klein remains as a British presence in the men's draw, while among the women there was a fine win for Samantha Murray.

The 28-year-old from Stockport, who is world-ranked 664, bridged a gap of 484 places in defeating Lesley Kerkhove of the Netherlands 5-7, 6-3, 7-5 in the first round.

Still waiting to get into action is 16-year-old Emily Appleton, world ranked 767, who faces world No 162 Cindy Burger in another GB v Holland battle.

What is a high-quality men's doubes event got underway tonight on Centre Court, with former Wimbledon champion Jonny Marray and his new partner Adil Shamasdin (Canada), who are seeded four, just beating the rain to defeat Marco Chiudinelli (Switzerland) and Franko Skugor (Croatia) 7-6 (7-1), 7-6 (7-2).

Their opposition includes last year's champions Marcus Daniell (New Zealand) and Marcelo Demoliner (Brazil), who are playing with different partners this time around, with Daniell having the confidence of winning the Stuttgart title last week with countryman Artem Sitak.