Fish advances to quarterfinals

 

Originally published on: 26/02/10 12:20

The 21st-ranked Fish is the only top-50 player remaining in the draw and one of only three seeded players still alive.

Second-seeded American Sam Querrey and number eight Lu Yen-hsun of Chinese Taipei crashed out in the second round on Wednesday while seeds numbers three to five never got through the opening round.

Fish was not perfect though, as he was broken twice in the opening set, but he did not have to be with his opponent struggling on serve.

Spadea was broken three times in the first set and twice in the second, winning just 49 percent (17-of-35) first serve points in the match.

Fish improved to 4-1 against the 34-year-old Spadea, who had reached the quarterfinals in each of the past five years.

Seeking his first title since 2006, Fish will take on sixth-seeded Florent Serra after the Frenchman defeated Germany’s Mischa Zverev 6-3 4-6 6-4.

Serra failed to hold on six of the seven break points he faced but converted on seven of his 17 opportunities to advance to the quarterfinals in one hour and 54 minutes.

Jeremy Chardy also moved into the round of eight with a 7-6 (7/4) 7-5 win over Kazakhstan’s Andrey Golubev. The Frenchman, who entered the tournament with a career-high ranking of number 52, had six aces to just one double fault while taking advantage of only two of 12 break chances.

Chardy will face Marcos Baghdatis, who continued his run at Delray Beach. The Cypriot followed an upset over number three Ernests Gulbis in the opening round with a 7-6 (9/7) 6-3 victory over Dudi Sela of Israel to move into the quarterfinals.

Now get the WORLD’S BEST TENNIS MAGAZINE here