Leicester Olympian Chris Adcock flew into the quarter-finals of the YONEX All England Open after smashing his way to victory in an all-English tie.

The 29-year-old Leicestershire shuttler, who competed at the 2016 Rio Olympic, forms England’s No.1 mixed doubles pairing and the Adcocks produced a typically experienced showing to down younger compatriots Jess Pugh and Ben Lane 15-21 21-15 21-15.

Pugh and Lane have long been thought of as the successors to the Olympic duo and started like a house on fire to win the first game, until the Adcocks turned things round to win comfortably amid raucous home support at Arena Birmingham.

Chris Adcock commented: “It wasn’t a good start from me! I didn’t play that great at the start at all! But we managed to find our rhythm just after the second started and once we felt a little bit more comfortable so happy that we made it through.

“Credit it to the guys, they got off to a really good start and really fought hard.

“We didn’t change anything in the second game, we were just making a lot of mistakes. I think we just settled in after that poor start but then got comfortable and found our rhythm.”

The pattern of the all-English tie followed that of the Adcock’s first round match on Wednesday, where they beat young Malaysian pair Chen Tang Jie and Peck Yen Wei after starting slowly.

The Adcocks reached the quarter-finals of the tournament this time last year and the semi-finals in 2017, but things get immeasurably steeper in the quarter-finals when they take on top-seeded Chinese duo Zheng Siwei and Huang Yaqiong.

“They’re obviously very very good!” Chris added. “Best pair in the world for the last year or so but we have pushed them really close before.

“We’re obviously just hoping that the home crowd can really get behind us so we’re going to go away and get prepared for that, prepared for a tough battle on court but we’re going to give it everything and enjoy our time on court.”

The 2019 YONEX All England – Badminton’s Greatest Show on the sport’s world tour – will wow fans at Arena Birmingham, 6-10 March. For tickets and information: www.allenglandbadminton.com or search All England tickets.