Tennis Capsules: Bryan brothers to open bid for record 62nd title
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Third-seeded Marcos Baghdatis of Cyprus beat American wild-card Ryan Sweeting 3-6, 6-2, 6-3 in second-round play at the Farmers Classic on Wednesday night.
Baghdatis fired 11 aces and had the same number of winners in advancing to his fifth quarterfinal of the year. He'll next play sixth-seeded Janko Tipsarevic of Serbia, who beat qualifier Somdev Devvarman of India 7-6 (11), 6-2.
Baghdatis had lost all three of his matches in his three previous tournaments, all on grass. It was his first win since a second-round victory at the French Open in May.
"I fought for the match without playing perfect tennis," he said. "I came to LA knowing I wasn't going to play my best tennis. I felt really bad on court and it's good to win when you feel bad."
Sweeting fell to 1-7 in ATP Tour matches this year, including first-round losses at the French Open and Wimbledon.
"I started off playing well," he said. "He started serving well. When he gets going, he's a tough player. He's a shotmaker. He can hit a winner from anywhere on the court."
Tipsarevic improved to 2-0 against Devvarman, who missed a chance to break into the tour's top 100 for the first time with a victory.
Rainer Schuettler of Germany outlasted American Robby Ginepri 6-3, 3-6, 6-4 in their first meeting since 2003. At 34, Schuettler is the oldest player in the singles draw.
Brothers Bob and Mike Bryan opened a bid to win their record 62nd career doubles title with a night match against Mardy Fish and Mark Knowles. The Bryans are five-time champions of their hometown tournament at the Los Angeles Tennis Center on the UCLA campus.
The late singles match was to feature No. 2 seed and defending champion Sam Querrey against Kevin Anderson of South Africa, who has yet to beat the American in two previous meetings.
Stosur celebrates ranking with a win
STANFORD, Calif. (AP) — Australia's Samantha Stosur celebrated her highest singles' ranking ever with a 6-1, 7-5 victory over U.S. qualifier Christina McHale on Wednesday in the second round of the Bank of the West Classic.
The match was Stosur's first since reaching No. 5 in the world.
"The high ranking feels good," Stosur said. "It was a goal for me to get to No. 10. Once I got to that point, all of a sudden I moved up to No. 5. To have another big jump like that so soon is really pleasing.
"It's not like I have changed anything dramatically overnight. It's just a combination of everything that I have been doing over the past few years and now it's all coming together. Once you produce some good results, it instills more belief. But I haven't changed anything in my game. I have still been working on the same things, just getting better at them."
The top-seeded Stosur needed just over an hour to beat the 161st-ranked McHale, finishing with eight aces and winning 76 percent of her first-serve points.
Third-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland and No. 7 Yanina Wickmayer of Belgium also advanced. Radwanska beat Ukrainian qualifier Olga Savchuk 7-6 (4), 6-2, and Wickmayer topped Slovakia's Dominika Cibulkova 6-1, 6-4.
Stosur will facce Wickmayer in the quarterfinals Friday.
All eight seeds remained alive heading into a late match between No. 2 Elena Dementieva of Russia and Japan's Kimiko Date Krumm.
Montanes, Gasquet win at Swiss Open
GSTAAD, Switzerland (AP) — Seventh-seeded Richard Gasquet rallied from a set down to beat Daniel Brands of Germany 6-7 (5), 6-3, 6-0 in the second round of the Swiss Open on Wednesday.
Fourth-seeded Albert Montanes from Spain, who is seeking a third title on outdoor clay courts this season, beat Austrian qualifier Andreas Haider-Maurer 3-6, 6-1, 6-0.
Montanes and Gasquet will meet in the quarterfinals.
In a match between unseeded players, Spain's Daniel Gimeno-Traver topped Andreas Beck of Germany 7-5, 6-4.
Gimeno-Traver next faces Igor Andreev of Russia or Switzerland's Marco Chiudinelli, whose match was suspended by darkness with the score 6-6 in the third set.
Andreev won the first set 6-3, wasted a match point in the second-set tiebreaker and lost serve when leading 5-3 in the decider.
Nikolay Davydenko into Croatia Open quarterfinals
UMAG, Croatia (AP) — Defending champion Nikolay Davydenko beat Stephane Robert 6-1, 6-2 to advance to the Croatia Open quarterfinals on Wednesday.
The top-seeded Russian will meet Juan Ignacio Chela, who defeated Italian qualifier Simone Bolelli 7-6 (5), 6-7 (4), 6-1.
Juan Carlos Ferrero, the 2009 finalist, downed Pablo Cuevas 4-6, 6-4, 6-4 for his 25th clay-court victory of the season.
"I expected a tough match," Ferrero said. "I beat him in three straight sets in May at Roland Garros, but it was tough. So I was ready."
The former No. 1 will play Alexandr Dolgopolov, who beat wild card Franco Skugor 7-6 (1), 6-3.
Dushevina beats Sevastova in Istanbul Cup
ISTANBUL (AP) — Defending champion Vera Dushevina of Russia defeated Anastasija Sevastova of Latvia 6-3, 6-7 (8), 6-2 Wednesday in the second round of the Istanbul Cup.
After narrowly losing the tiebreaker, Dushevina never looked in trouble in the final set. She served six aces to one by Sevastova.
Anastasia Rodionova of Austria beat fifth-seeded Tsvetana Pironkova of Bulgaria 6-1, 3-6, 6-2, and sixth-seeded Andrea Petkovic of Germany beat Ekaterina Makarova of Russia 7-6 (5), 5-7, 6-3. Elena Vesnina of Russia downed Stefanie Voegele of Switzerland 6-3, 6-2.
