Ivan Ljubicic of Croatia topped defending champion Nicolas Kiefer of Germany 6-4, 6-2
Wed Feb 27, 1:38 PM ET
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – Second-seeded Yevgeny Kafelnikov (news –
profile – photos) of Russia advanced to the quarterfinals of the Dubai
Open on Wednesday after an hour-long second set, beating Sjeng Schalken of
the Netherlands 6-1, 7-6 (5).
“He is a tough opponent who will not give you many free points, I toughed
it out, fought hard and was able to win the game,” Kafelnikov said.
In other second-round matches, Ivan Ljubicic of Croatia topped defending
champion Nicolas Kiefer of Germany 6-4, 6-2; eighth-seeded Jiri Novak of
the Czech Republic beat Axel Pretzsch of Germany 7-5, 6-1 and Fabrice
Santoro of France upset fourth-seeded countryman Sebastien Grosjean 6-2,
7-5.
Kafelnikov cruised to a comfortable one-set lead in 26 minutes, but was
broken in the second and fourth games of the second set. The Russian broke
Schalken in the third and seventh.
In first-round matches, sixth-seeded Roger Federer of Switzerland breezed
through his match against Adrian Voinea of Romania 6-3, 6-4 in just 56
minutes, and Max Mirnyi of Belarus defeated Renzo Furlan of Italy 7-6 (5),
6-2.
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