Second seeds Team England produced their second 5-0 win in a row to crush Austria at the European men’s team championships in Warsaw this afternoon.

Performance Director Ian Moss’s squad, who defeated Lithuania
5-0 yesterday, came up trumps again this afternoon with three-times English National champion Rajiv Ouseph once more setting the tone.

The Middlesex man crushed Michael Lahnsteiner 21-12 21-13 and Carl Baxter followed his lead when the Avon player disposed of David Obernosterer 21-11 21-17.
 
Once again Lancashire’s Harry Wright secured the winning lead with a 21-11 21-6 win over Matthias Bertsch.

Anthony Clark then teamed up with Chris Adcock to topple Peter Zauner and Lahnsteiner 21-10 21-13 before Chris Langridge and Robin Middleton looked set to dispose of Obernosterer and Roman Zirnwald in straight games before wasting a match point in the second and having to settle for a 21-12 20-22 21-12 win.

Team England, who are supported by Center Parcs, need to keep up the momentum tomorrow when they face Spain in the morning before tackling hosts Poland in the crunch evening match to determine which team goes straight into the semi-finals.

The Poles beat Lithuania 5-0 today, having beaten Spain 4-1 yesterday.

Victory over Poland would leave Team England one win away from a guaranteed trip to the Thomas Cup finals in May with the two finalists in Warsaw and the third-place team going to Kuala Lumpur.

Tonight Team England women’s squad matched the men for the second day running as they toppled Portugal 5-0.

Yorkshire’s Kate Robertshaw became the fourth Team England player to make a winning debut in the first two days.

Jersey’s Elizabeth Cann got Team England off to a solid start with a 21-17 21-8 win over Telma Santos.

Cheshire’s Helen Davies then got the better of Helena Pestana 21-12 21-19 before Robertshaw beat Vanua Leca 21-17 21-13 to give England a winning lead.

With that it was over to Jenny Wallwork and Gabby White to beat Pestana and Figueira 21-14 21-5 in just 20 minutes before Heather Olver and Mariana Agathangelou outplayed Santos and Leca 21-14 21-15. 

The women's crunch match comes tomorrow against group seeds Russia in a match which will determine which of them progresses to the quarter-finals.

Russia beat Portugal 5-0 yesterday while England were beating Croatia 5-0 and defeated Croatia by the same score today.

Ian Moss singled out Robertshaw for praise, saying: "Today's performances were clinical but Kate made a good debut and there were stand-out efforts from Liz Cann and Harry Wright.

"Russia are next up for the women and we know we are underdogs. We need to win one singles and the two doubles.

"The men play Spain and Poland and we know we need stand-out performances to beat the Poles. We need key performances from the experienced players to get the win we need. It is a hard one to predict."