Lance-Pierre du Toit and Megan Basson are the South Africans left in the draw for the Digicall Futures 1 tennis tournament. It is the first of three Digicall Futures tournaments that are played at the Coetzenburg courts of Stellenbosch University.
Du Toit had a fiercely competitive match against American Connor Farren. He needed three sets and more than three hours to win the second-round match 6-7, 6-4 and 6-2. Farren was on a high coming into the match after beating top seed Benjamin Lock in the first round.
Both players had an injury time-out in the third set, but it was the 19-year-old Du Toit who guts it out to be the only South African man left in the tournament.
In the battle of the teenagers, Basson had to fight her way back into the match after being a set and a service break down. Delien Kleinhans won the first set 6-3 and was leading 1-0 after breaking Basson’s serve at the start of the second set. Basson immediately struck back though and got back on the winning track to win the second set 7-5 and seal the match in the third with 6-4 after two hours and 20 minutes.
The 16-year-old Basson will now have to face the top seed Maya Tahan from Israel. Tahan battled her countrywoman Yuval Keren earlier and won 7-6, 6-4 in more than two hours on court.
Other seeded players through to the quarterfinals are Ekaterina Makarova (RUS, 3) and Shahar Biran (ISR, 5).
Remember you can follow the scoring at the ITF Live Scoring page http://live.itftennis.com/en/live-scores/ and even watch some Live streaming of the action at http://live.itftennis.com/en/live-streams