BASEL: Roger Federer began his pursuit for a sixth Swiss Indoors Basel title with an explosive 47-minute 6-2, 6-1 victory over Gilles Muller on Wednesday after Rafael Nadal reached the quarter-final with a 6-1, 6-1 win against Pierre-Hugues Herbert.

Top seed Federer hit 12 winners in a 24-minute first set and the Swiss 17-time Grand Slam champion continued his domination in the second set without losing a single point on his serve and next plays Denis Istomin of Uzbekistan who had 14 aces in a 6-1, 6-1 rout of Poland’s Jerzy Janowicz.

“It was a very easy match. He couldn’t do anything on my serve. He was struggling with the return,” Federer told reporters.

Nadal, playing through appendicitis, was equally impressive, needing just 57 minutes to dispatch France’s Herbert and next plays either Andrey Golubev of Kazakhstan or 17-year-old Croatian wild card entry Borna Coric.

Coric, tipped for a bright future, upset Latvian sixth seed Ernests Gulbis 7-6 (7-2), 6-3 while Golubev advanced over Russian Teimuraz Gabashvili 6-3, 6-3.

Belgian seventh seed David Goffin is also through to the quarters after beating Croatia’s Ivan Dodig 7-6 (7-0), 6-4 and next plays either fourth-seeded Milos Raonic of Canada or Donald Young of the United States.

Fifth seed Grigor Dimitrov maintained his slim chances of a possible ATP World Tour Finals place by defeating promising German teenager Alexander Zverev, 2-6, 6-4, 6-2.

MURRAY, FERRER EASE THROUGH

VALENCIA: Andy Murray’s return to form continued as he progressed to the second round of the Valencia Open on Wednesday with a 6-3, 6-3 win over Austria’s Jurgen Melzer.

Top seed David Ferrer was also victorious 6-3, 7-5 over Italy’s Andreas Seppi and will play countryman Fernando Verdasco next.

Murray, who won this tournament in 2009 and claimed his 30th tour title when he rallied to defeat Ferrer at the Erste Bank Open in Vienna on Sunday, will play Fabio Fognini of Italy in the second round.

Earlier, Pablo Andujar caused the first major upset of the tournament by defeating second-seeded Tomas Berdych 6-3, 6-2 in 72 minutes.

The world number 46 will play Serbia’s Dusan Lajovic in the second round.

Last year’s champion Mikhail Youzhny of Russia also suffered a earlier exit as he was beaten by Brazilian qualifier Thomaz Bellucci 7-5, 6-3. Bellucci will next face Roberto Bautista Agut of Spain, who defeated Santiago Giraldo 6-4, 6-4.

Published in Dawn, October 24th, 2014