It was a rain-interrupted opening day at the Lexus Ilkley Trophy on Saturday, with a delay of roughly four hours in the early afternoon disrupting the plans of players and fans alike at the Ilkley Lawn Tennis and Squash Club.

Between midday and 4pm, spectators who had entered the grounds of the event free of charge had to entertain themselves through other means – although that being said, there is plenty to do outside of watching tennis if you happen to get down to the event over the next week.

While everyone was waiting for the rain to stop and the courts to dry off, children could take part in various tennis-related activities, adults were able to feed and water themselves at the vast array of street food and bar options, and fans and players mingled around the grounds to play football with huge, football-sized tennis balls.

Eventually, though, the planned schedule of matches did all take place, and from a British perspective, things didn’t quite go to plan.

Britain had four players entered into qualifying as wildcards – for those who don’t know what that means, each tournament has license to give a handful of ‘free spaces’ to players who wouldn’t ordinarily have been ranked highly enough to reach the qualifying or main draw. These wildcards are usually handed out to homegrown players that have performed particularly well over the course of the year so far, are young, up-and-coming prospects from the junior tour, or have recently returned from injury.

Being ranked lower – often significantly lower – than their opponents obviously means expectations are low, but wildcards often have a tendency to prove themselves worthy of the trust placed in them – the most obvious example being Goran Ivanisevic’s amazing Wimbledon title way back in 2001, which he won after being given a wildcard into the main draw after a lengthy injury layoff.

The four players with qualifying wildcards were 32-year-old Dan Cox, 25-year-old Stuart Parker, 25-year-old Charles Broom, and 18-year-old Luca Pow.

Charles Broom started the way encouragingly with a victory over his eighth seeded Italian opponent Franco Agamenone. Broom was aided slightly by an injury to his opponent, which eventually forced the Italian out of the match in the second set, but Broom was leading 6-2 3-0 and in control of the match when that happened.

Unfortunately, this was not a sign of things to come: following a couple of rain delays, play eventually got under-way properly in the late afternoon, and one by one the Brits tumbled out of the qualifying draw. Stuart Parker won the first set against his Chinese opponent despite going a break down in the very first game of the set, but couldn’t maintain his advantage and eventually fell in three sets, while Dan Cox and Luca Pow were both eliminated in straight sets as the evening rolled in.

But there are plenty more British hopes to take in tomorrow, as the Women’s event kicks off – there are nine British women in qualifying, including 14-year-old Hannah Klugman who may be a familiar name to those of you who read my weekly round-up of British tennis on this very website.