Top-seeded Mikhail Youzhny of Russia beat Rajeev Ram of the US 6-1, 6-4 to advance to the quarter-finals of the St Petersburg Open on Thursday.
Third-seeded Martin Klizan of Slovakia also reached the final eight by beating Simone Bolelli of Italy 6-3, 6-3. Klizan hit five aces and never faced a break point. He next faced Ricardas Berankis of Lithuania, who advanced when eighth-seeded Jurgen Zopp of Estonia retired with a back injury after losing the first set 6-3.
Earlier, fourth-seeded Fabio Fognini eliminated 2009 champion Serghiy Stakhovsky of Ukraine 7-6 (7/4), 6-4, while fellow Italian Flavio Cipolla made the final eight with a 6-2, 6-7 (5/7), 6-3 victory over Grega Zemlja of Slovenia.
Youzhny served hard in the first set and allowed Ram to score only three points on receiving. Youzhny then made a break in the opening game of the second set and held his serve to close the match on his first match point.
Yesterday, in his eighth quarter-final appearance at the tournament since 2001, Youzhny was to face Guillermo Garcia-Lopez of Spain, who was leading 6-1 and 3-1 when Paolo Lorenzi of Italy retired with a left Achilles injury.
Fognini was leading 3-1 and 40-15 up in the first set when he made three double faults and Stakhovsky broke him and forced a tiebreaker.
He then accelerated to a 5-1 lead in the second set and though the Ukrainian broke for 5-4, Fognini served the match out to love.
Next up for him is Roberto Bautista-Agut of Spain, who ousted Russia’s Teimuraz Gabashvili 6-3, 6-4, while Cipolla was to play against Gimeno-Traver of Spain, who stopped Lukasz Kubot of Poland, 6-4, 7-6 (7/5).
MOSELLE OPEN
AP, METZ, France
Seventh-seeded Gael Monfils of France continued his successful return after several months out with a knee injury on Thursday, reaching the quarter-finals of the Moselle Open with a 7-6 (7/4), 7-5 victory over compatriot Nicolas Mahut.
It was Monfils’ second match since losing to Brian Baker of the US at the Open de Nice in May. The 2009 Metz champion hit 12 aces to secure a match against second-seeded Philipp Kohlschreiber.
“The fatigue builds up, I have lots of little niggles,” Monfils said. “I still feel a bit heavy, so I push and grimace a bit. But day after day, I’m getting better.”
Kohlschreiber, a runner-up three years ago, defeated Benoit Paire of France 6-2, 1-6, 6-1.
Third-seeded Marcel Granollers of Spain was forced to retire with an abdominal injury when trailing Ivo Karlovic 6-2, 2-2. The Croatian faces Nikolay Davydenko in the quarter-finals after the eighth-seeded Russian defeated Gilles Muller of Luxembourg, 7-5, 6-4.
Fifth-seeded Andreas Seppi of Italy is also through after cruising to a 6-2, 6-1 victory over Frenchman Vincent Millot in just over an hour. American Jesse Levine faces a quarter-final against top-seeded Jo-Wilfried Tsonga after beating Michael Berrer of Germany 6-3, 3-6, 6-0.
Taiwanese world No. 1 women’s doubles star Hsieh Su-wei on Saturday overcame a first-set loss to win her opening match at the Madrid Open. Top seeds Hsieh and partner Elise Mertens of Belgium, with whom she last month won her fourth Indian Wells women’s doubles title, bounced back from a rocky first set to beat Asia Muhammad of the US and Aldila Sutjiadi of Indonesia 2-6, 6-4, 10-2. Hsieh and Mertens were next to face Heather Watson of the UK and Xu Yifan of China in the round of 16. Thirty-eight-year-old Hsieh last month reclaimed her world No. 1 spot after her Indian
EYES ON THE PRIZE: Armed with three solid men’s singles shuttlers and doubles Olympic champions, Taiwan aim to make their first Thomas Cup semi-final, Chou Tien-chen said Taiwanese badminton star Tai Tzu-ying yesterday quickly dispatched Malaysia’s Goh Jin Wei in straight sets, while her male counterpart Chou Tien-chen beat Germany’s Kai Schaefer, as Taiwan’s women’s and men’s teams won their Group B opening rounds of the TotalEnergies BWF Thomas and Uber Cup Finals in Chengdu, China. World No. 5 Tai beat Goh 21-19, 22-20 in a speedy 33 minutes, her fourth straight victory over the world No. 24 shuttler since they first faced each other in the quarter-finals of the 2018 Malaysia Open, where Tai went on to win the women’s singles title. Malaysia followed up Tai’s opening victory
Chen Yi-tung (陳奕通) secured a historic Olympic berth on Sunday by winning the senior men’s foil event at the 2024 Asia Oceania Zonal Olympic Fencing Qualifiers in United Arab Emirates. Chen defeated Samuel Elijah of Singapore 15-4 in the final in Dubai to secure the only wild card in the event, making him the first male Olympian fencer from Taiwan in 36 years and only the sixth Taiwanese fencer to ever qualify for the quadrennial event. The last appearance by a Taiwanese male fencer at the Olympics was in 1988, when Wang San-tsai (王三財) and Cheng Ming-hsiang (鄭明祥) competed in Seoul. The
A soccer jersey carrying a national map including disputed Western Sahara has become a hot commodity in Morocco after a diplomatic dispute with Algeria. Retailers said RS Berkane jerseys have been flying off the shelves after a Confederation of African Football (CAF) Cup match against Algerian club USM Alger was canceled last month over the jerseys. “We are overwhelmed by the influx of messages and requests,” said Brahim Rabii, representative of the official RS Berkane jersey distributor. Algeria broke off diplomatic relations with Morocco in 2021, partly over the issue of Western Sahara. The former Spanish colony is largely controlled by Morocco, but claimed