Murray and Soares into Queen's semi-finals after three-set win

Murray and Soares were 7-6 (7-1) 4-6 10-6 victors on Court 1 at Queen's Club as they continue to build up their grass court preparations ahead of Wimbledon. The pair, who won the Australian and US Opens in 2016, took the first set on a tie-break after no breaks of serve but lost the second as their American and New Zealand opponents fought back well. The Brit and his partner, who won the recent Stuttgart ATP, managed to win the champions tie-break 10-6 to book their place in the final four of the tournament. The third-seeds will meet Croatia's Marin Cilic, who is also in the quarter-finals of the men's singles competition, and Marcin Matkowski of Poland in the semi-finals. Elsewhere, Britain's Johanna Konta was beaten in straight sets in the second round of the Aegon Classic in Birmingham by American Coco Vandeweghe. The fourth seed lost 6-1 6-3 to the American, who is coached by Pat Cash, in one hour and five minutes and misses out on a spot in the quarter-finals. She won just 11 points in the opening set which was over in just 24 minutes but battled back well and will now head to Eastbourne to continue her Wimbledon preparations. "I didn't find my footing and once you go down as I did in the first set it's very difficult to get back in the match," said the 26-year-old. "I think I did a reasonable job of playing as well as I could after that but it was nowhere near enough. The match showed two ends of the spectrum. She played very well and was hitting a big ball."

Sportsbeat 2017