scoreboard frozen? That's a good sign..........

it has now disappeared which means james has won :D

Without following Wardy's progress particularly closely i'd like to say that i'm keeping an eye on him now. That is a fantastic win (Steven, i presume his best thus far?) and congratulations in completely stuffing a known quantity ranked virtually in the top 100.

Didn't Vinny get a Wimby WC last year? (you have to laugh else you'd just cry!)

L16: (Q) James Ward WR 271 beat (2) Vincent Spadea (USA) WR 105 by 6-0 5-2 ret.

QF: (Q) James Ward WR 271 v Jonathan Dasnières de Veigy (FRA) WR 312 - Thursday, 3rd on Stadium Court (hence livescored on bet365) at about 22.00 BST

Retiring at 6-0 5-2 down is pretty poor if you ask me, but there's no doubt that James deserved his win. DDV won by retirement as well (against Scoville Jenkins) - he had a dire first quarter of the year but won the Vero Beach Future the week before last. He last played a Brit in 2006, losing 3 & 2 to Lee Childs. A couple of weeks earlier, he lost to Alan Mackin, who was the last Brit to win clay court Challenger QF, back in 2004. Come on Wardy!

SC: No, 16 points (3 for qualifying + 13 QF points) - only in doubles do they get 27 points for winning just two matches here!

Hence he's 10 points to the good this week and that should take him up to about WR 265.

Some stats to put Wardy's achievement into context:

James had only reached one Challenger QF before this latest stint in the Americas (Rimouski last year, also in the Americas!) - he has now reached two more in three weeks.

In Pereira two weeks ago, James became the first Brit to reach a Challenger QF on clay since Martin Lee in 2006. He's now done it twice in three weeks, once on red clay and once on green clay.

As far as I can tell, James had only beaten two players in the top 200 before - Bohli WR 137 and Udomchoke WR 179, both in Queen's qualifying last year, so Spadea at WR 105 is easily the highest-ranked player (and player with the highest career high - 18, albeit quite a while ago) he has ever beaten, and he didn't just beat him, he wiped him off the court.

The closest James has gone to beating a top 100 player was when he went down 13-11 in the final set t/b to Guccione (then WR 89) in last November's Jersey Challenger and when he lost 6-4 in the 3rd to Safin in R1 at Queen's last year.

If we leave out the players whom BT.net members have created websites for (i.e. Boggo, Slabba, Fleming, Marray), it's been a brilliant week so far, with Challenger quarter-finalists in two different countries and Chris trying to make it three tonight, not to mention the exploits of the young Brits in Newcastle.

Fantastic news for James.

Shame he won't be in French qualies as you feel he could do okay.

It's great Wardy has finally remembered he can he play on clay these past few weeks, but this result does look like Spadea must have been injured.

Veigy is more than beatable though and if he beats him he should be odds on to be top 250 by the week of Queens (which he needs to be to get a Wimbly WC) with two 15ks in Kuwait and the Notts challenger coming up.

If he gets to the SF I wouldn't bank on him beating Russell or Yani though, who are much more comfortable on clay than Spadea.