Singles success has proved short-lived for New Zealand’s Michael Venus at the Heineken Open.

Venus couldn’t follow up his enthralling first round victory over Colombia’s Alejandro Gonzalez, going down in straight sets 7-5 6-4 to Lucas Pouille of France.

Venus began the day expecting to play fifth seed Tommy Robredo but the Spaniard’s withdrawal due to an adductor injury meant he instead played lucky loser Pouille.

The 20-year-old Frenchman, ranked 136 in the world, had been beaten in the final round of qualifying but he soon showed he was well capable of matching Venus.

Like the New Zealander he had a strong serve, but he also showed solid ground strokes and his error rate was much lower than Venus, and one break each set proved enough.

Venus had a set point at 5-4 on Pouille’s serve in the first set but the Frenchman held his nerve and broke Venus the next game, serving out the set soon afterwards.

Pouille then broke Venus midway through the second set and though Venus had a couple of break points, Pouille’s serve got him out of trouble.

His quarter-final opponent will be either ninth seed Yen-Hsun Lu of Taiwan or Albert Ramos-Vinolas of Spain.

Robredo was not the only seed who couldn’t complete a match on Wednesday as third seed Roberto Bautista Agut of Spain pulled out with illness during his clash against Adrian Mannarino of France.

Mannarino had won the first set and was 2-1 up with a service break when the Spaniard pulled out.

Mannarino will play another lucky loser, Alejandro Falla of Colombia, who overcame the man who beat him in qualifying, Kenny de Schepper of France.

Also through to the quarter-finals are fourth seed Kevin Anderson of South Africa, eighth seed Steve Johnson of the United States, and Johnson’s fellow American Donald Young.