Welsh ace Tesni Evans is showing English squash players the way in Manchester.

For the first time in history, England have no women’s representation in the PSA World Championships, while Cardiff-born Evans, now based in Rhyl, has booked her place in the last eight at Manchester Central Convention Complex.

She faces Egypt’s eighth seed Nour El Tayeb in Manchester, having knocked out England’s former world champion Laura Massaro in the third round.

That was the biggest victory of her career so far, but the 25-year-old is lining up an even bigger triumph against El Tayeb.

“I’m really looking forward to it,” said Evans, who is seeded 16th and is the lowest ranked player left in the tournament.

“We’re pretty much the same age, we grew up playing juniors together and we’ve played a couple of times this year with one win each.

“Being in the quarter-finals it would be stupid not to believe in myself.

“But in the last eight here you’re pretty much talking about the best players in the world and they’re all . . . playing really good squash.

“It’s going to be the hardest thing to do, but if I don’t believe I can go as far as as I can there’s no point in me giving it a good go.”

This match between Evans and US Open winner El Tayeb guarantees there will be a new women’s semi-finalist.

El Tayeb, 24, is from Cairo, plays out of the Heliopolis Club in the city and is currently ranked number eight in the World.

Evans, though, will take belief from her win against Massaro, who is at number four in the World rankings.

While Welsh squash awaits the Evans v El Tayeb clash, England are looking into their poor performance at the AJ Bell World Championships.

Sarah-Jane Perry went out against Joelle King of New Zealand in four games. King lost the first, but powered to victory 11-1, 6-11, 14-12, 11-6 in 55 minutes.

Fellow England player Victoria Lust went down 3-1 against Egypt’s Raneem El Welily, leaving her country without a player in the last eight for the first time since the sport’s pinnacle event began in 1979.

Over the last nine years England have had five women’s finalists, but they are now condemned to look on from the sidelines.

Welsh number one Evans is now the only British representative and plays the biggest match of an increasingly promising career today (Thursday).

Manchester Central Convention Complex hosts the opening day of quarter-final action at the 2017 Championships.

Three-time World Champion Nick Matthew, the only English player left standing across both the men’s and women’s draws, plays World number two Mohamed ElShorbagy for a 23rd time on the PSA World Tour.

Matthew, who is 13-9 down on the head-to-head record between the pair, is playing his last ever World Championships after announcing his decision to retire at the end of the season.

He is aiming to claim a huge scalp in ElShorbagy, a player in red-hot form after disposing of last year’s runner-up Ramy Ashour in round three.

The other men’s quarter-final today sees Frenchman Gregory Gaultier take on New Zealand’s Paul Coll for the second tournament in a row.

Two-time Women’s World champion Nour El Sherbini will look to reach a third successive semi-final in this event. Sherbini plays World number five Nouran Gohar.

You can watch LIVE coverage on SQUASHTV and Eurosport Player.

Order of play today (Wednesday, UK times)

2.30pm [1] Nour El Sherbini (Egypt) v [5] Nouran Gohar (Egypt) followed by [1] Gregory Gaultier (France) v [8] Paul Coll (New Zealand)

7pm [8] Nour El Tayeb (Egypt) v [16] Tesni Evans (Wales) followed by [5] Nick Matthew (England) v [3] Mohamed ElShorbagy (Egypt)