India’s Dipika Pallikal defeated Line Hansen of Denmark in a marathon first round encounter to enter the pre-quarter-finals of the Allam British Open squash championships here.
In what was the longest match of the tournament so far, world number 15 Pallikal had to dig deep for 76 minutes to get the better of her Danish opponent 13-11, 14-16, 11-6, 8-11, 11-4 at Ponterfact, near here on Tuesday.
The round of 16 matches will now be played in an outdoor glass court of the multi-purpose KC Stadium.
Pallikal will face local favourite Laura Massaro in her next match on Thursday.
In their last encounter at the 2012 Australian Open semi-finals, Pallikal lost to her English opponent.
However, Chennai-born Joshana Chinappa meekly surrendered to top seed Malaysian Nicol David 4-11, 5-11, 4-11 in another first round match.
In the men’s competition, world number 19 Saurav Ghosal went down to fourth seed Gregory Gaultier of France in the pre-quarter-finals on Wednesday. Ghosal lost 8-11, 13-11, 7-11, 0-11.