Positives for Murray protege Mchugh despite first-round defeat

Aidan Mchugh suffered defeat in his first-round match at the Glasgow Trophy ATP Challenger but there was better news for fellow wild card James Ward who scored an important victory on his road to recovery from knee surgery.

Glasgow 17-year-old Mchugh had plenty of positives to take from his 7-6(5), 6-3 loss to France’s David Guez:

Mchugh said: “It’s nice to feel like my level is there to beat a lot of these guys.

“It’s just a few wee things like, when I was serving for the first set, not to give away as many cheap errors. That’s a bit frustrating now but something I can learn from, closing out sets against guys like that who are not just going to go away when they go a break down.”

Mchugh had the benefit of advice from mentor Andy Murray

“I spoke to him (Murray) about how to play him (Guez) a little bit. Andy actually knows these guys that I’m playing, so that’s quite cool and hopefully that kind of thing can help in the future.

Ward came through a tough match against Japan’s sixth seed Kaichi Uchida, winning 6-4, 7-6(6). Ward, who had knee surgery last year and did not play for seven months, returned to court in February and is in need of valuable ranking points:

There was also good news for Scotland’s Jonny O’mara and his partner Scott Clayton, who are top seeds in the doubles draw. They got their campaign off to a winning start, beating the Japanese pairing of Hiroki Moriya and Kaichi Uchida 6-7(7), 6-2, 10-5.