Sensational Serb

Basel: World No 3 Novak Djokovic whitewashed hapless Czech Jan Hernych 6-0, 6-0 on Thursday to reach the quarterfinals of the Swiss Indoors.

Djokovic, attempting to win his fourth ATP tournament of the season, was almost apologetic after needing only 52 minutes to dispatch the world No 59.

"It's hard to talk about a 6-0, 6-0 result," said Djokovic. "The win is what counts. He didn't play very well today, actually, he made a lot of unforced errors and didn't put any pressure on me so I just kind of cruised through the match.

"I think I'm in quite good shape. I feel physically and mentally quite good on the court. I didn't play perfect tennis today; I needed his unforced errors as well. I think his level of performance was very low today."

Djokovic's quarterfinal opponent will be Switzerland's No 2 Stanislas Wawrinka who had a much tougher time to beat Finland's Jarkko Nieminen 7-5, 2-6, 6-1.

In the day's most dramatic match, fourth seed Marin Cilic saved three match points in the third set tiebreak before defeating Viktor Troicki 7-6, 6-7, 7-6 in just over three hours.

Frenchman Richard Gasquet also saved two match points in the second-set tiebreak before rallying to edge American John Isner 4-6, 7-6, 6-2.

Swiss wildcard Marco Chiudinelli reached the second ATP quarterfinal of his career as he defeated compatriot and qualifier Michael Lammer 2-6, 6-3, 6-3.

World No 1 Roger Federer is firm favourite to win his hometown tournament for the fourth year in a row. He was to faces Russia's Evgeny Korolev in yesterday's quarterfinal.

Meanwhile, Top seed Andy Murray survived a scare before advancing to the quarterfinals of the Valencia Open on Thursday when he defeated Argentina's Leonardo Mayer 6-4, 3-6, 6-3.

The world No 4 from Britain, who is returning from a six-week wrist injury lay-off, looked set for a comfortable victory as he broke serve in the seventh game of the first set to seal a one-set lead.

But world No 64 Mayer hit back, breaking serve twice as he raced to a 5-0 lead in the second set. Murray was able to recover one of the breaks, but could not prevent the Argentine from levelling the match.

The experience of Murray eventually told in the third set as he broke serve in the sixth game to open up a 4-2 lead before going on to close out victory with his eighth ace after two hours and 22 minutes.

Second seed Nikolay Davydenko and fourth seed Fernando Verdasco, both strong contenders to join Murray at the ATP World Tour Finals in London later this month, cruised through.