Nishikori registers historic win

Tennis French Open: First Japanese in 82 years to reach French Open quarters, Ivanovic advances

Kei Nishikori became the first Japanese in 82 years to reach the French Open quarterfinals on Sunday with a 6-3, 6-4, 6-2 win over Russia's Teymuraz Gabashvili.

Fifth seed Nishikori goes on to face either Czech fourth seed Tomas Berdych or Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, the 14th seeded Czech, for a place in the semi-finals.

Jiro Satoh was the last Japanese man to enjoy such a run in Paris when he went on to the semi-finals in 1931 and 1933.

Nishikori hadn't played since Wednesday after scheduled third round opponent Benjamin Becker withdrew with an injury. The 25-year-old looked the fresher of the two out on a damp, chilly Court Suzanne Lenglen dominating the first set and racing to a 5-1 lead in the second before 74th-ranked Gabashvili briefly rallied with a face-saving break in the eighth game.

The third set followed a similar path of domination with Nishikori again stretching to a 5-1 lead.

Gabashvili saved two match points but the Japanese, who had beaten the Russian in Barcelona in April on his way to a successful defence of his claycourt title, won through.
Nishikori finished with 40 winners, more than three times his opponent's and took his clay record this year to 13-2.

Ana Ivanovic made the French Open quarterfinals for the first time since her 2008 title run where she'll face Elina Svitolina, the first Ukrainian to make the last eight.

But defending champion Maria Sharapova's scheduled last-16 clash against Lucie Safarova was pushed back until Monday after rain caused a lengthy stoppage at a chilly Roland Garros.

The Russian second seed now faces the prospect of playing matches on two successive days with the first two women's quarter-finals already programmed for Tuesday.
Seventh-seeded Serb Ivanovic defeated Russian ninth seed Ekaterina Makarova, a semi-finalist at the Australian Open in January, 7-5, 3-6, 6-1 to book her eighth career Grand Slam quarterfinal.

Watched again by German World Cup winning football star Bastian Schweinsteiger, the 27-year-old Ivanovic shrugged off a two and a half hour rain stoppage to secure her third three-set win in four rounds in Paris.

The 20-year-old Svitolina beat fellow former Roland Garros junior champion Alize Cornet on a windy, chilly Court Philippe Chatrier 6-2, 7-6 (11/9).
"It's amazing to be in the quarter-finals again. To be honest, coming into the tournament I didn't really expect that at all," said Ivanovic.

"But I really worked hard for each match. I worked hard even before the tournament to reach the quarter-final again."

Svitolina, seeded 19, is only the second Ukrainian woman to reach a Grand Slam quarter-final after Kateryna Bondarenko made the last eight at the 2009 US Open.
It was Svitolina's first win over Cornet in three meetings and the result ended French hopes in the women's singles for another year.

She displayed nerves of steel to achieve victory, failing to serve out the tie in the 10th game of the second set and then allowing five match points to slip through her fingers.
However, she secured victory on her sixth match point when Cornet went long with a backhand, her 42nd unforced error of the windswept tie.

Svitolina will take a 6-0 losing record into her clash with Ivanovic, a run that includes a second round loss in Paris last year and again on clay in Madrid earlier this month.

"I hope I can serve better, of course, because I was serving not so good against her in Madrid," said Svitolina.

With four men's last-16 ties still to be played on Court Philippe Chatrier and Court Suzanne Lenglen, it was decided that Sharapova and Safarova will play their fourth round on Monday instead.

Sunday's other fourth round clash between 33-year-old Italian Flavia Pennetta, who has never played in the French Open quarter-finals, and Garbine Muguruza, the Spanish 21st seed, was also shelved.

Serena ousts Azarenka

World number one Serena Williams needed all her fighting qualities to beat Victoria Azarenka 3-6, 6-4, 6-2 and reach the last 16 on Saturday.
The American spent most of the late evening match trailing, but flicked the switch just in time, to reel off the last six games of the match with a flurry of winners.
Her victory means the 33-year-old is the first woman in the professional era to win 50 matches at each of the four Grand Slams.