KYLE EDMUND is helping British tennis fans forget that Andy Murray was an injury no-show at the Australian Open.

Edmund advanced to the quarter-finals for the first time, his best grand slam singles result, with a 6-7 (4/7) 7-5 6-2 6-3 win yesterday over 33-year-old Andreas Seppi, a player 10 years his senior.

In mentioning Edmund, the statistics sheets at Melbourne Park were full of references to Murray, the five-time losing finalist here and three-time grand slam champion who pulled out of the season-opening major to have hip surgery.

The Johannesburg-born Edmund is the first British man other than Murray to reach the quarter-finals here since John Lloyd was beaten in the quarters in 1985.

He is the eighth British man to reach the quarter-finals of a grand slam tournament in the Open era, but he has a way to go to catch Murray’s 30 appearances.

With a current ATP ranking of 49, Edmund is clearly a work in progress, but heading in the right direction.

He’s already notched up five-set wins over US Open finalist Kevin Anderson in the first round here and Nikoloz Basilashvili in the third. His win against No 12-ranked Anderson was a career-best performance.

He can’t pinpoint any major physical changes he’s made to his game, so perhaps it’s all mental.

“I’m making better decisions in the moments I need to, or playing smarter tennis,” Edmund said. “It’s a very small margin and balance between winning and losing. It’s always been like that.”

Seppi was impressed.

“He played very well, really picked up the pace in the third and fourth sets,” said Seppi, who received treatment in the final set for a right shoulder ailment. “It was an impressive performance.”

Edmund’s quarter-final opponent will be third-seeded Grigor Dimotrov, who beat Nick Kyrgios later yesterday.

He played Dimitrov at the Brisbane International two weeks ago and lost in three sets in the semifinals.