Ivan Ljubicic of Croatia topped defending champion Nicolas Kiefer of Germany 6-4, 6-2
Wed Feb 27, 1:38 PM ET DUBAI, United Arab Emirates - Second-seeded Yevgeny Kafelnikov (news - profile - photos) of Russia advanced to the quarterfinals of the Dubai Open on Wednesday after an hour-long second set, beating Sjeng Schalken of the Netherlands 6-1, 7-6 (5).
"He is a tough opponent who will not give you many free points, I toughed it out, fought hard and was able to win the game," Kafelnikov said. In other second-round matches, Ivan Ljubicic of Croatia topped defending champion Nicolas Kiefer of Germany 6-4, 6-2; eighth-seeded Jiri Novak of the Czech Republic beat Axel Pretzsch of Germany 7-5, 6-1 and Fabrice Santoro of France upset fourth-seeded countryman Sebastien Grosjean 6-2, 7-5. Kafelnikov cruised to a comfortable one-set lead in 26 minutes, but was broken in the second and fourth games of the second set. The Russian broke Schalken in the third and seventh. In first-round matches, sixth-seeded Roger Federer of Switzerland breezed through his match against Adrian Voinea of Romania 6-3, 6-4 in just 56 minutes, and Max Mirnyi of Belarus defeated Renzo Furlan of Italy 7-6 (5), 6-2.
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