INDIAN WELLS, California (AP) — David Nalbandian reached the fourth round of the Pacific Life Open for a third straight year when he beat Paul-Henri Mathieu of France 6-7 (3), 6-2, 6-0 yesterday.Mathieu prevented 10th-ranked Nalbandian from serving out the first set at 5-4 and 6-5, and ran over the Argentine in the tiebreaker. But Nalbandian shot to 3-0 in the second set and cruised to victory.

The fourth round was as far as Nalbandian went the previous two years, and to overcame that bogey he will have to go through No. 8 Ivan Ljubicic, the Croatian who eliminated former Australian Open champ Thomas Johansson 6-1, 6-4.

Ljubicic was coming off winning in Doha, Qatar, his third final this year.

British teen Andy Murray easily won 6-1, 6-3 against France's Nicolas Mahut, who had put out Marat Safin.

Richard Gasquet of France made it to the fourth round for a second successive year when he downed Jarkko Nieminen of Finland 6-3, 1-6, 6-3, and Novak Djokovic of Serbia dispatched Evgeny Korolev of Russia 6-2, 6-1.