Nadal Still Standing, Faces Berdych In Quarter-finals

ATP World No. 3 Rafael Nadal, the final champion standing in the 2010 BNP Paribas Open draw, fought his way into the quarter-finals Wednesday afternoon with a 7-5, 3-6, 6-3 victory over towering American John Isner at the ATP World Tour Masters 1000 tournament in Indian Wells.

The 6’9” Isner had held all 22 service games entering his fourth-round match and had not faced a single break point, but Nadal converted on his first opportunity to grab a 6-5 lead and successfully served out the first set.

Isner extended the two-time champion to a third set in Indian Wells for just the sixth time in 28 matches, but gave up the decisive break in the fourth game when his return hit the net cord and bounced back.

Despite the loss, Isner said his performance against Nadal surpassed his own expectations: “Actually, kind of exceeded it, to be honest with you. I never played him, never hit with him or practiced with him. His ball has some junk on it, which is tough to handle. I felt like I played pretty well. I might have run out of gas in the third set, but that's what he does. He makes you work so hard for every point. He played better today.”

The 23-year-old Spaniard is the only past champion to have reached the quarter-finals this year of the nine that began the tournament. Three-time champion Roger Federer was upset by Marcos Baghdatis on Tuesday night, while 2008 winner Novak Djokovic lost to Ivan Ljubicic on Stadium 2 Wednesday. Defending champion Vera Zvonareva was the last of six women’s titlists to bow out, falling in fourth-round action Tuesday afternoon.

Nadal has now won 19 of his past 20 matches in Indian Wells, and is an impressive 25-3 overall at the tournament. He will attempt to reach the semi-finals for the fifth straight year when he takes a 6-3 head-to-head record into his next match against Czech Tomas Berdych.

The 19th-seeded Berdych had no problems getting by Serbian Viktor Troicki, defeating the No. 23 seed 6-1, 6-3 to avenge his loss in last year’s BNP Paribas Open.

Troicki had won just one game entering the fourth round. After a first-round bye, he had advanced when Pablo Cuevas retired with a back injury just one game into their match, and then earned a walkover into the fourth round when Nikolay Davydenko withdrew with a broken wrist.

Berdych, who won the ATP World Tour Masters 1000 title in 2005 at Paris, is through to the Indian Wells quarter-finals for the first time in six appearances.

Roland Garros finalist Robin Soderling also reached the quarter-finals for the first time after defeating No. 9 seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga 6-3, 6-4. The eighth-seeded Swede will face the winner between No. 4 seed Andy Murray and unseeded Spaniard Nicolas Almagro.