MONTPELLIER, France (AP) - Top-seeded Richard Gasquet of France easily advanced to the Open Sud de France quarterfinals after beating countryman Paul-Henri Mathieu 6-1, 6-3 on Thursday.
Gasquet, the defending champion, saved all seven break-point chances he faced and broke Mathieu’s serve twice in each set. He next faces another countryman, qualifier Albano Olivetti.
Third-seeded Jerzy Janowicz of Poland beat Adrian Mannarino of France 7-6 (2), 6-3 and next plays seventh-seeded Edouard Roger-Vasselin of France, after he won 6-3, 6-4 against Dustin Brown of Germany.
Earlier, veteran Marc Gicquel beat second-seeded Gilles Simon 7-6 (4), 6-3 in their first meeting for six years. The Frenchmen dropped serve twice in the first set, but Giquel broke Simon two more times in the second.
Gicquel moves on to face sixth-seeded Jarkko Nieminen of Finland, who advanced with a 7-6 (5), 7-6 (5) win against wild card Pierre-Hugues Herbert, despite the Frenchman’s 23 aces.
Fifth-seeded Gael Monfils had little trouble beating Portugal’s Joao Sousa 6-3, 6-2, and Olivetti downed Russia’s Nikolay Davydenko 7-6 (5), 6-7 (5), 7-5.
But in another second-round upset, fourth-seeded Dmitry Tursunov of Russia lost 7-5, 6-4 against Denis Istomin of Uzbekistan, who plays Monfils next.
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