Johns and Boulton have never reached a Tour semi-final before

British beach volleyball duo Denise Johns and Lucy Boulton reached their first European Tour semi-final at the English Masters in Blackpool.

They lost to Czech duo Lenka Hajackova and Sona Novakova Dosoudilova then missed bronze after defeat to Austrians Doris and Stefanie Schwaiger.

"It's our first tour semi-final so we're making progress all the time, said Bolton, 23, from Essex.

"We go to China in October on a real high and are working to London 2012."

Johns, 31, added: "We're very happy; we'll enjoy two weeks off now before going to the Far East.

"If we keep improving at this rate we'll be in good shape for the Olympics."

In the women's final, Hajackova and Dosoudilova fell to Belgians Liesbet Mouha and Liesbet Van Breedam 21-14 21-15.

And in the men's final Spaniards Pablo Herrera Allepuz and Adrian Gavira Collardo beat Swiss pair Sascha Heyer and Patrick Heuscher 21-16 21-14 in a keenly fought contest.

GB's top men's duo Steve Grotowski and Gregg Weaver were knocked out before the weekend's quarter-final stages.

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