Federer and Wozniacki reach US Open quarter-finals
Last year, Roger Federer and Caroline Wozniacki finished second best at the US Open, but the pair are on course to go one better in 2010 after booking their place in the quarter-finals with straight sets wins.
World No. 2 Federer, runner-up to Juan Martin del Potro in 2009, broke Jürgen Melzer twice in the first set of their fourth-round match before the 13th seed forced the second set to a tiebreak – the closest the Swiss has come to losing a set all tournament.
Once Federer had the second set in his pocket, however, Melzer’s chances of completing an upset victory over the five-time US Open champion faded and Federer wrapped up the match 6-3, 7-6(4), 6-3.
In the women’s draw, Wozniacki is living up to her top seeding, knocking out 2006 US Open champion Maria Sharapova 6-3, 6-4 in her fourth round match.
It was a match where consistency was key for Wozniacki, who unsurprisingly was unable to match the more attacking Sharapova for winners – the Russian produced 32 of them to double Wozniacki’s total – but who more than made up for that fact with a tidy game.
While Sharapova made 36 unforced errors for the match to undo all her good work in the winners department, the 20-year-old produced just 10 unforced errors over the one hour and 53 minutes the contest lasted. Nine double faults did little to help Sharapova’s cause either as she tripled the number of doubles committed by the top seed.
Not that Wozniacki was about to concede that the 14th seed’s wayward shot-making was a major factor in helping her to reach the final eight in Flushing Meadows for the second year running.
“No,” she said when asked whether Sharapova gave a lot of the match to her. “I was playing well out there. I made her do those errors, and I'm really happy to be through and that I won this match.”
Sharapova wasn’t the only former champion to depart the women’s draw on day eight, with Svetlana Kuznetsova beaten 7-5, 7-6(4) by the unseeded Dominika Cibulkova in her fourth round match. Cibulkova, a French Open semi-finalist in 2009, will now take on Wozniacki in the quarters.
Federer has what, on paper, should be a tougher match as he seeks to book a place in the semi-finals with fifth seed Robin Soderling awaiting the 16-time Grand Slam champion in the final eight.
Soderling, who defeated Federer in the quarters at Roland Garros, took four sets to win past 21st seed Albert Montanes in the round of 16, a match that saw a total of 83 unforced errors (40 from Soderling and 43 from the Spaniard).
The other men’s quarter-final match-up that was decided on day eight will see third seed Novak Djokovic take on 17th seed Richard Gasquet, while in the women’s draw Wimbledon runner-up Vera Zvonareva conceded just three games in her fourth round match to move through to the quarter-finals and a match against 31st-seeded Estonian Kaia Kanepi.
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