Youzhny moves into quarterfinals in St Petersburg

Written by: Global Chick on 27th October 2011

Youzhny moves into quarterfinals in St Petersburg

Mikhail Youzhny of Russia returns to Marcel Granollers of Spain during the semi final match at the Suisse Open tennis tournament in Gstaad, Switzerland, 30 July 2011. EPA/PETER KLAUNZER |

Former world number eight Mikhail Youzhny is through to the quarterfinals of St Petersburg Open after a three set win over Frenchman Julien Benneteau. The two spent a little over two hours on court today during this second round match.

Youzhny is a two-time runner up in St Petersburg. He will now meet another Frenchman Adrian Mannarino who knocked out the first seed Gilles Simon in the opening round. Mannarino had a straight set win yesterday over Czech player Lukas Rosol.

Some first round matches were played on Wednesday. Andreas Seppi of Italy defeated qualifier Vasek Pospisil of Canada 7-5 7-6 (4). Seppi will encounter Igor Andreev in the second round. Andreev left the number six seed Marcel Granollers of Spain behind after three set win 3-6 6-4 7-6 (4).

The number two seed Janko Tipsarevic got the better of Olivier Rochus of Belgium in his first round. Tipsarevic won 6-2 7-5 and is one of the players still looking for a spot at the end-of-year event in London.

The in form Serbian has won two titles in the last couple of weeks at the Malaysian Open and at the Kremlin Cup in Moscow. The World No. 13 was also the runner up in Delray Beach and Eastbourne this year.

Tipsarevic’s second round opponent will be Michael Berrer of Germany who downed the defending Champion Mikhail Kukushkin in three sets.

For the second time in two weeks Philipp Kohlschreiber and Carlos Berlocq came face to face in the first round. Kohlschreiber has been the winner on both occasions and on Wednesday he needed three sets to get past the Argentinian. The German will clash with American Alex Bogomolov Jr. in the second round.

British duo Colin Fleming and Ross Hutchins are the first team to be through to the St Petersburg semi-finals. The Brits overcame James Cerretani and Philipp Marx 6-3 3-6 10-4.

Two first round matches were played yesterday. Top seeds Frantisek Cermak and Filip Polasek cruised past Israeli wildcards Dudi Sela and Saar Steele 6-2 6-3. Russian wildcards Mikhail Elgin and Alexander Kudryavtsev notched up a win over Umag Champions Marin Cilic and Lovro Zovko. The Russians will now meet the defending Champions Daniele Bracciali and Potito Starace of Italy.

SCHEDULE – THURSDAY, 27 OCTOBER, 2011  CENTRE COURT start 1:00 pm

[7] A Bogomolov Jr. (USA) vs P Kohlschreiber (GER)

[8] D Tursunov (RUS) vs P Starace (ITA)

M Kohlmann (GER) / A Waske (GER) vs M Mertinak (SVK) / M Youzhny (RUS)

Not Before 7:00 PM

M Berrer (GER) vs [2] J Tipsarevic (SRB)

A Seppi (ITA) vs I Andreev (RUS)

COURT 1 start 1:00 pm

[1] F Cermak (CZE) / F Polasek (SVK) vs M Granollers (ESP) / P Riba (ESP)

[Q] D Lajovic (SRB) vs [WC] D Sela (ISR)

[4] M Cilic (CRO) vs S Devvarman (IND)

[WC] M Elgin (RUS) / A Kudryavtsev (RUS) vs [2] D Bracciali (ITA) / P Starace (ITA)