Roddick and Isner Breeze into quarterfinal at Winston Salem Open

Written by: Global Chick on 25th August 2011

Roddick and Isner Breeze into quarterfinal at Winston Salem Open |

World No. 21 Andy Roddick won his third round match today against Santiago Giraldo of Colombia 6-1 6-3 at the Winston Salem Open.

Roddick served five aces and won 60 percent of his first service points against the Colombian. Roddick is in need of some match practice before the US Open starts on Monday. The former world number one has only won two matches since Wimbledon and both came here at the Salem Winston Open.

Roddick moves on in the draw to play Juan Monaco of Argentina in the quarterfinals, who beat Japanese youngster Kei Nishikori easily 6-0 6-3. The Japanese player had a good win in the round before over the number twelve seed Pablo Andujar.

Roddick and Monaco have never played each other before. The American has one title under his belt this season. Andy was the US Open Champion in 2003 and has not won a Grand Slam since. If he is fit and playing well he can ruffle some feathers when the Open starts next week.

American John Isner had a tough first set against Finn Jarkko Nieminen today. The tall Isner won 7-6 (4) 6-2 to advance into the quarterfinals where he will face the popular Cypriot Marco Baghdatis.

Isner only dropped seven points on serve and hit 10 aces in today’s match that lasted 64 minutes. “It was pretty solid, same score as yesterday. It took me a while to get used to how he was playing,” Isner said.

The number eight seed Marcos Baghdatis defeated Steve Darcis of Belgium 7-5 6-0. Baghdatis was 3-5 down in the first set but he came back and didn’t lost a game after that.

Isner leads 2-0 in matches against the Cypriot. The two played each other a couple of weeks ago at the ATP World Tour Masters 1000 in Montreal. Isner downed Baghdatis 6-3 6-4 in the first round.

In the bottom half of the draw qualifier Julien Benneteau has made his way through to the quarterfinals. The Frenchman won after a struggle against Igor Andreev of Russia 2-6 6-1 7-6 (5). Benneteau now faces Sergiy Stakhovsky of the Ukraine. Stakhovsky overcame the former world number three Nikolay Davydenko 6-4 6-4. The two played last week in Cincinnati and Davyenko won their previous meeting.

The number three seed Alexandr Dolgopolov beat Bulgarian Grigor Dimitrov 6-4 1-6 7-6 (7). The match lasted two hours and 12 minutes. Dolgopolov will face Dutchman Robin Hasse, who reached the quarterfinals by winning over Canadian lucky loser Pierre-Ludovic Duclos.