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Berdych in last eight

Dubai: Tomas Berdych reached his first quarterfinal at the Dubai tennis championships on Wednesday, defeating Nikolay Davydenko 6-3, 7-6(5) at the Aviation Club.

Third-seeded Wimbledon finalist Berdych reversed a massive loss streak against former No. 3 Davydenko, who led 9-1. It marked the seventh straight year the two have met.

Davydenko, the 2008 Dubai semifinalist, almost took it into a third set as he fought back in the second-se tiebreaker from 2-5 down.

But a forehand long at 5-5 gave the Czech a match point, which Davydenko lost from a forehand wide by just a few centimetres.

Davydenko now finds his tennis in crisis.

“It's really difficult now situation just because I lost first round at the Australian Open and Rotterdam and Marseilles,” said the Russian.

“The confidence is very low. “It's important now to find my game. I saw today that when I control the baseline, I can play really much better win more points.” Davydenko also admitted he's made another racquet switch, another complicating factor on court. “After Marseilles I changed racquets again. I come back in my old racquet. My baseline control is much better. I barely had five months with the old one.”

Berdych will meet Petzschner in the quarterfinal, though the German won their last match in May, 2010, in Munich. Frenchman Richard Gasquet beat Sergei Bubka of the Ukraine 6-2, 7-5, while Florian Mayer put a second German into the last eight as he beat Andrei Golubev of Kazakhstan 6-3, 6-4.

Another seed exited as Sergiy Stakhovsky beat No. 8 Ernests Gulbis 6-3, 5-7, 6-1.

The results: Second round: Gilles Simon bt Lukas Rosol 6-2, 6-3; Richard Gasquet bt Sergei Bubka 6-2, 7-5; Florian Mayer bt Andrey Golubev 6-3, 6-4; Tomas Berdych bt Nikolay Davydenko 6-3, 7-6(5); Philipp Petzschner bt Philipp Kohlschreiber 6-0, 4-6, 6-2; Sergiy Stakhovsky bt Ernests Gulbis 6-3, 5-7, 6-1 . — AFP

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