Murray joins Soderling in the quarter-finals of the China Open
Published:Andy Murray completed a straightforward, straight sets win over Albert Montanes despite finding himself a break down in the first set.
Murray can look forward to a quarter-final with either Ivan Lubijic or highly-rated Ukrainian 21-year-old Alexandr Dolgopolov after beating Montanes 7-5, 6-3.
The Scot will be confident of progressing from that game to set-up a potential semi-final with the China Open fourth seed, Robin Soderling.
Murray joins Soderling, Novak Djokovic and Nikolay Davydenko in the quarter finals of the event in Beijing, and Djokovic has stated his desire to play Murray in the final.
Djokovic said: “Why not a final with Andy Murray? We have not played each other for a long time.”
The Serb holds a 4-3 head-to-head advantage over Murray but with the top four seeds all likely to progress to the semi-finals, it’s not a foregone conclusion that the two will make it to the final.
Djokovic faces Giles Simon for a place in the semi-finals and is 2/9 to beat the Frenchman when they take to the court at 5.35am Friday morning.
If Davydenko is to join Djokovic in the semi-final, he will have to overcome American big server John Isner – he is 8/15 to beat Isner.
With Murray and Soderling only just off the court, they won’t play their quarter-finals until Saturday morning where Soderling faces a tough match against eight seed and world number nine David Ferrer.
With the ATP world tour finals in London just weeks away, the top eight ranked players in the world qualify for the event.
Just Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer have qualified so far and just 170 points separate seventh placed Andy Roddick and ninth-placed Ferrer, which could provide Ferrer with the extra motivation to beat Soderling.
Soderling is currently fifth in the world rankings. See the full China Open betting odds market here.
