Glasgow’s Imogen Bankier and Edinburgh-born Robert Blair, the No. 7 seeds, suffered a disappointing straight games defeat in the second round of the mixed doubles at the Yonex All-England Open in Birmingham.

The British pair were unranked when they reached the quarter-finals last year, but they failed to make their seeded place this year as they went out 24-26 19-21 in a close tussle against Indonesia’s Flandy Limpele and Russia’s Anastasia Russkikh.

The first game was crucial. Bankier and Blair had three game points but, after a run of swinging fortunes, the underdogs took the game 26-24 on their fourth game point. The second was also close, but Limpele and Russkikh won three points in a row from 18-19 down to earn a place in the last eight against the top seeds from Indonesia, Nova Widianto and Lilyana Natsir.

Bankier and Blair had defeated Limpele and his previous partner, Vita Marissa, at the same stage 12 months ago, and they were disappointed to lose out. “It was a very close match,” said Bankier. “It is really disappointing that we couldn’t quite make it.”