I'm thinking positive for a Brit Girl title here!

Although there has been much to admire so far this year after week 13 the British singles title count stands at a mere 2,viz for the men Chris Eaton's Glasgow 15k in week 2 and for the women Bally's Midland 100k in week 6.

Time for #3 methinks!

Jade Curtis fell in Q1 but the other three British contenders in the qualies won at least once; Lisa Whybourn still getting up to speed after injury giving the 3rd qseed a good fight in Q2 before going down 7-5 6-2; and Tara Moore unfortunately coming up against Britain's in-form Anna Smith in Q2 after a super rankings-defying win in Q1.

Anna duly took her place in the Main Draw bringing the British contingent to three and, excellently, all three are still there at the QF stage

Anna was up against 7th seed world #126 Pervak (RUS) in R1 and was 6-1 2-0 up when the Russian retired; and in R2 she was up against 16 year old wild card Zanevska (UKR) who had comfortably accounted for the world #174 in R1. Anna seems to be riding the crest of a wave at the moment though and saw Zanevska off 6-2 6-1 ; next up is world #158 19 year old Rebecca Marino of Canada. Good luck Anna

GB #3 Anne Keothavong is seeded 6th here and cruised through R1 against a Lucky Loser 6-2 6-1 and in R2 cruised the first set 6-0 against world #164 Antoniychuk (UKR) but had to work in the second before taking it 7-5 Next up is the 3rd seed world #116 Valerie Tetrault of Canada. If Anne and Anna both win they meet in the semis

In the other half of the draw, right at the top of the draw in fact, is GB #2 Katie O'Brien who apart from winning her R1 at the Australian Open has had a nightmare 2010 so far and dropped from her peak ranking of world #84 to now be #105 and is in fact defending 40 points for reaching the QF here last year when it was a $100k+H event.

Happily for the first time this year, Katie has won two consecutive MD matches so far winning 3&1 in R1 and 1&4 against world #186 Minella (LUX) in R2

Next up is 8th seed world # 130 Bojana Jovanovski (SRB); good luck Katie

Great work Annie

Katie (3&0) and Anna (1&2) ran aground in the QFs today

But former world #48 Anne Keothavong looks like she's getting well up to speed with today's emphatic win 6-3 6-4 over the 3rd seed, world 120 Valerie Tetrault of Canada

Next up in the SFs for Annie another Canadian, Anna's nemesis today, unseeded Rebecca Marino. Keep going Special K!

Heigh ho

Thought Annie had her name on this title but it wasn't to be; she went down 6-2 6-4 to Marino.

Should be another decent step towards the top 100 in next week's rankings list though

It was worth the trip though!

Anna Smith's points from here and her RU spot at the Jersey $25k the week before have added up to +22 in the world rankings today to a new CH #166 ; and for the second week running up 2 notches in the GB pecking order this time from #8 to #6

Annie +7 to world #109 (that's +15 in just two weeks)

And even Katie, although she slipped 3 places as the QF here was worth more points in 2009, defended just enough points to hang on to the world #108 spot... and the GB #2 berth ...by 7 rankings points