HAVING dipped his toes into the waters of the ATP Challenger Tour, world No 616 Jonny O'Mara cannot wait for his next opportunity.

The 21-year-old Keighley-born Scot qualified for the AEGON Surbiton Trophy two weeks ago without dropping a set, and then beat China's Zhe Li 6-2, 6-4 in the first-round proper before losing 6-3, 6-2 to fourth seed Bjorn Fratangelo (United States).

Last week, the grass-court circus moved north for the AEGON Ilkley Trophy and, for the second successive match, Arbroath-based O'Mara met a member of the world's top 100.

Given a wild card, O'Mara, who was born in Airedale Hospital and lived in Keighley for five months, lost 7-6 (7-5), 6-2 to top seed Jordan Thompson of Australia.

However, the Scot, who was ranked 701 before his exploits at Surbiton, where he beat four players with significantly higher rankings – Jeevan Neduncheziyan (India) is 568, Britons Luke Bambridge and Joshua Milton are 517 and 440 and Li is 247 – reckons he is not too far away from players of the standard of Fratangelo, who was 99 in the world when he faced O'Mara, and Thompson, who headed the Ilkley field at 90.

O'Mara, whose ranking jumped 88 places after Surbiton and whose dad Dave is a psychologist and mum Jane a pharmacist, said: "I just love playing on grass. It is so much fun, and a lot of how you play is down to hand-eye skills, and I am good at that.

"I haven't worked out my schedule after Ilkley but I would like my future to be at Challenger level rather than Futures level, and I feel I am capable of that.

"I had a series of niggling injuries but I have been injury free for the last six to seven months."