Federer breezes through
MONTREAL (AP) Defending champion Roger Federer breezed past Italian qualifier Fabio Fognini 6-1, 6-1 to reach the quarterfinals of the Rogers Cup on Thursday.
The Swiss star, who won his fifth straight Wimbledon title this year, has won 14 straight matches at the Canadian tournament. He's had victories in 2004 and 2006 and sat out in 2005 with an injury.
Federer needed only 45 minutes to win the match including 18 for the first set.
"By the time I sat down, I was (only) kind of starting to get warm, because 18 minutes is really fast, you know," the top seed said. "And the games were going quick, my service games, especially.
"And I knew that if I could just press a little bit more in the beginning of the second set, that would be it. So I was happy it all went my way, and that I didn't have to struggle too much out there."
Fognini, ranked 139th in the world, reached the third round with a victory over Peter Polansky followed by an upset of 13th-seeded Andy Murray of Britain, but was overmatched by Federer who lost only two points on his service in the first set and five in the second.
"In normal actually perfect conditions today, and playing a solid match against a youngster, that was an excellent match," Federer said. "But it's going to be different the next match, so I'll have to adapt. But I hope I can keep this level of play, because if I play like this, I think I'm in good shape."
Federer will face the winner of a late match between Lleyton Hewitt of Australia and Dominik Hrbaty of Slovakia in the quarters.
Third-seeded Novak Djokovic of Serbia and fourth-seeded Nikolay Davydenko of Russia also advanced, while Radek Stepanek of the Czech Republic upset 12th-seeded Tommy Haas of Germany 6-3, 2-6, 6-2.
Djokovic, who has three tournament wins this year, ousted David Nalbandian of Argentina 6-2, 6-3. Nalbandian was a Rogers Cup finalist in 2003.
Davydenko posted a 7-6 (8), 6-3 victory over fellow Russian Mikhail Youzhny.
Davydenko dropped the first game to open the second set, but broke back to tie the set 2-2 and then coasted to his third win in as many meetings with the 14th-seeded Youzhny.
Davydenko said this week he is playing with a stress fracture in his left foot, which caused him to retire from a match with Martin Vassallo Arguello of Argentina at Poland last week.
That loss is under investigation by the ATP because of suspicious betting patterns. Davydenko has denied any wrongdoing.