BURNLEY amateur Michael Hunt is out to impress the England selectors in the Lancashire Open at Blackpool North Shore, which starts today.

Hunt has played in the professional competition for the last two seasons, finishing joint fifth last year, and hopes to improve even more this time around.

The 23-year-old, who harbours hopes of becoming a professional himself, knows a good performance will boost his chances of selection for the national squad - and may show whether he has what it takes to turn pro.

Hunt's confidence is high after his quarter final finish at the English Amateur Championships a fortnight ago and he hopes to carry that on this week.

"I'm looking forward to it," he said. "I'll try to do better than last year.

"The North Region has some outstanding players on it and I look up to them and respect them but I would consider myself on a par with a lot of the players there.

"I wouldn't go around thinking 'well, I'm better than him and I'm better than him'.

"But with no disrespect to those players, but I want to be even better than them, playing on the tours.

"I need to do well this week to help my England chances more than anything else. I need to get my name heard a little bit more."

Hunt was delighted with his performance at the English Amateur, where he beat three England internationals on his way to the last eight.

"It was just one of those days," said Hunt, speaking about the Thursday he beat international Paul Bradshaw in the morning and then went on to knock one of the country's top amateurs, Zane Scotland, out in the afternoon.

"I was two down in both games but I didn't give up. I was on a real high afterwards and I didn't sleep very well that night so when I came to play Richard Finch in the last eight I probably wasn't at my best.

"I was five down after seven but then I won the eighth and ninth for it to go back to three down and I thought 'If I can win the 10th I'll really be putting the pressure on' but then I lost that one!

"He said afterwards that that hole was key because if I'd won that alarm bells would have started ringing.

"But I will just keep playing well for Lancashire and if I do that they will put me forward for England selection."